Excerpt from: Lawyers.com (click for full article)
In two recent cases, the EEOC settled with employers who had fired workers because of positive drug tests for prescription drugs. But in states where medical marijuana is legal, can employers fire employees who test positive but have prescriptions for the drug?
Under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), of course, employers are forbidden from discriminating against workers based on their disabilities.
Nor can an employer discriminate against an employee based on its perception – via a drug test for legal prescription drugs or otherwise – that an employee has a disability.
The two recent cases – one in Georgia and the other in Tennessee – involving prescription drug use and disability show very clearly that an employer violates the ADA when it tests employees for legal drugs and then fires them based on those test results.
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