ALERT! Hospital won't HIRE OBESE WORKERS!!

LovelyLibra79

I saw this article in one of my nursing forums..Discrimination comes in many forms! I copied the direct link to the article & part of it below for your review.
What are your thoughts regarding obesity and employment discrimination?

LINK: http://www.texastribune.org/texas-he...obese-workers/

A Victoria hospital already embroiled in a discrimination lawsuit filed by doctors of Indian descent has instituted a highly unusual hiring policy: It bans job applicants from employment for being too overweight.

The Citizens Medical Center policy, instituted a little more than a year ago, requires potential employees to have a body mass index of less than 35 — which is 210 pounds for someone who is 5-foot-5, and 245 pounds for someone who is 5-foot-10. It states that an employee’s physique “should fit with a representational image or specific mental projection of the job of a healthcare professional,” including an appearance “free from distraction” for hospital patients.

“The majority of our patients are over 65, and they have expectations that cannot be ignored in terms of personal appearance,” hospital chief executive David Brown said in an interview. “We have the ability as an employer to characterize our process and to have a policy that says what’s best for our business and for our patients.”

Employment lawyers say Citizens Medical Center’s hiring policy isn’t against the law. Only the state of Michigan and six U.S. cities — including San Francisco and Washington, D.C. — ban discrimination against the overweight in hiring.

“In Texas, employers cannot discriminate against employees because of their race, age or religion,” said DeDe Church, an Austin-based employment lawyer. “Weight is not one of those protected categories.”