Articles Discussing Particular Medical Conditions Under the ADA.

A case currently pending before the Eighth Circuit will address whether ADA protections should extend to obese workers. With more than 2/3 of the US adult population considered overweight, recognition of obesity as a disability under the ADA – defined as physical or mental impairment that substantially limits major life activities – will result in accommodations and protections in unprecedented numbers.

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is designed to protect people with disabilities from discrimination in the workplace. Under the ADA, an employer must provide a reasonable accommodation to an employee with a disability if the employee requests an accommodation. Employers should take note of a recent decision that includes a new class within the definition of disability. In Jacobs v. N.C. Administrative Office of the Courts, the court reversed the district court and found that social anxiety disorder is a protected disability under the ADA.

In Weaving v. City of Hillsboro,1 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit waxed nostalgic by reversing a jury and lower court finding that a police officer with Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) had a “disability” within the meaning of the 2008 amendments to the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The Ninth Circuit held that the former officer was not disabled, because his ADHD – and associated abrasive behavior toward colleagues – did not substantially limit him in the major life activities of working or interacting with others. Before the amendments to the ADA, this decision might not have been noteworthy. Given the far more expansive interpretation of “disability” under the 2008 ADA Amendmendts Act (ADAAA), however, the Weaving case assumes the aura of a “Man Bites Dog” story by resisting the tendency of courts to err on the side of finding threshold protection under the ADAAA.