School Board of Nassau County v. Arline
Supreme Court of the United States
480 U.S. 273 (1987)
Arline (plaintiff), an elementary school teacher, suffered three separate tuberculosis relapses requiring hospitalization; after the third relapse, the school (defendant) suspended her with pay for the rest of the year and then discharged her at year's end, solely because of the recurring illness. Arline argued her condition made her a handicapped person protected from disability-based firing under federal law. The trial court found she wasn't handicapped under the statute and, even if she were, wasn't qualified to teach; the appeals court reversed, holding people with contagious diseases fall within the law's coverage and remanding to determine whether infection risk made her unqualified for the job.
Whether courts should typically defer to the reasonable medical judgment of public health officials in determining whether an individual with a contagious disease is otherwise qualified to perform a job.