Obesity can be a disability according to European Justice
Remember our article dated June 12, entitled “ European justice could define obesity as a handicap ”: it was a question of a dismissal of a person because of his obesity.
This person, Karsten Kaltoft (who then weighed 158kg at the time of the events), had seized the Danish Justice following his dismissal. The file, by its complexity, had then been transmitted to the European Court of Justice (ECJ), which has now given a preliminary opinion on the question .
The opinion of the European Court
The Advocate General announced in a preliminary opinion that “ if obesity reaches such a degree that it clearly hinders participation in professional life, then it may be a handicap ”.
Clearly, according to European Justice, for the most severe cases of obesity , obesity can therefore be a handicap under the law. This would therefore concern people whose Body Mass Index (BMI) is greater than 40kg/m2 , even if obesity is diagnosed as soon as the BMI exceeds 30kg/m2 ( more information on our dedicated page when calculating BMI ). For information , Karsten Kaltoft’s BMI was 54 at the time of the events, which is an extremely high value.
Be careful, however, because the opinion of Niilo Jaaskinen, the Advocate General, is not a legally binding decision. Indeed this opinion must be approved by a final decision of the European Court of Justice. The experts, however, indicated on Thursday that they expected the court to uphold the verdict. In which case the decision will be applicable throughout the European Union .
The objective of the Court was really to assess whether Community law prohibited discrimination based on obesity, and whether it could be considered a disability. The Advocate General took the view that Community law does not expressly prohibit discrimination on the grounds of obesity, adding that severe obesity could be a disability.
For Karsten Kaltoft, the file should therefore be able to return soon to Denmark , where the Justice will have to make a decision based on all the elements that may have been provided by the European Court. It remains to be seen whether the Danish Justice will consider that the case of Karsten Kaltoft falls within the definition that will have been made of disability, in fact in addition to being in the context of ” severe obesity “, it must ” hinder clearly participation in professional life “.
A self-inflicted disability?
The Advocate General rejected the idea that a ‘self-inflicted’ disability would be less worthy of protection than another disability. Discussions have indeed focused on the fact that obesity could be the very cause of those who suffer from it, following an energy balance that is too unbalanced (in other words, excessive consumption in relation to daily caloric expenditure).
Upcoming changes?
If in Denmark the case of Karsten Kaltoft is indeed considered a handicap, then as we indicated in our previous article , many changes could be made.
Such a definition could indeed allow certain obese employees to claim new relationships with their employer. For example, adapted workstations as well as meals dedicated to the canteen.
But modifications could also be considered outside the framework of the work. For example, obese people could benefit from disabled parking spaces .
At the present time, however, these assumptions await the approval of Justice, as well as the reaction of the organizations concerned: the changes could be more or less moderate and reasonable.
Stephen Paul is the lead author and founder of My Health Sponsor. Holder of a diploma in health and well-being coaching with more than 200 articles in the field of health, he makes it a point of honor to offer advice based on reliable information, based on scientific research, and verified by health professionals.