Workers with diabetes in the US to gain from new rule

Fri, 25 Mar 2011
A rule regarding the definition of disabilities introduced by the Obama administration in the US will bring new benefit for workers suffering from diabetes and epilepsy. The change means that employers will be prevented from discriminating against workers with these conditions, and that employees have the opportunity to win workplace accommodations.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) in the United States have said that staff with conditions such as diabetes, cancer, epilepsy and bipolar disorder should be considered as having a disability, allowing proper legal protection for those employees.

Chai Feldblum, commissioner at the EEOC, commented "I am confident that these regulations will work well for both people with disabilities and employers." Employers have argued that the new requirements, published in the Federal Register, will be straightforward to implement.

The EEOC also said that staff with post-traumatic stress disorder, HIV infection, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) will be classifiable as disabled, including those who had previously suffered from the conditions but don’t exhibit any symptoms now. The rule change will apply to all companies with 15 or more workers.

Businesses are forced to make reasonable accommodations for disabled employees unless doing this imposes an undue hardship, with accommodations being such things as ensuring the workplace is more accessible, part-time scheduling, job restructuring, or allowing a leave of absence.

Link to this page

Copy and Paste the following HTML into your page.

Join us