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Case C-354/13 Kaltoft v Municipality of Billund – can obesity be a disability under EU equality law?

Case C-354/13 Kaltoft v Municipality of Billund – can obesity be a disability under EU equality law?
Case C-354/13 Kaltoft v Municipality of Billund – can obesity be a disability under EU equality law?
According to 2012 OECD data, 52% of EU adults are overweight or obese. It is thus not surprising that the recent decision of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in Kaltoft (Case C-354/13), on whether obesity discrimination can amount to disability discrimination, has created quite a stir in the press. Following Advocate General (AG) Jääskinen’s Opinion, some media suggested that ‘Severe obesity is a disability’. As will be discussed in this post, the CJEU did not quite go as far as to accept that obesity is a disability, but it did recognise that, in some cases, differential treatment on the basis of obesity can amount to disability discrimination. Hence, this judgment marks another step forward towards clarifying the scope of EU equality law and bringing about a consistent application at national level.
Benedi Lahuerta, Sara
657ceee7-1cbf-42b5-bd45-e3c12d66e465
Benedi Lahuerta, Sara
657ceee7-1cbf-42b5-bd45-e3c12d66e465

Benedi Lahuerta, Sara (2015) Case C-354/13 Kaltoft v Municipality of Billund – can obesity be a disability under EU equality law? European Law Blog.

Record type: Letter

Abstract

According to 2012 OECD data, 52% of EU adults are overweight or obese. It is thus not surprising that the recent decision of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in Kaltoft (Case C-354/13), on whether obesity discrimination can amount to disability discrimination, has created quite a stir in the press. Following Advocate General (AG) Jääskinen’s Opinion, some media suggested that ‘Severe obesity is a disability’. As will be discussed in this post, the CJEU did not quite go as far as to accept that obesity is a disability, but it did recognise that, in some cases, differential treatment on the basis of obesity can amount to disability discrimination. Hence, this judgment marks another step forward towards clarifying the scope of EU equality law and bringing about a consistent application at national level.

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Published date: 9 April 2015
Organisations: Southampton Law School

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 383903
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/383903
PURE UUID: eb9577e6-4bc4-451d-830e-f536cf31c405
ORCID for Sara Benedi Lahuerta: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0002-2769-372X

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 27 Nov 2015 15:05
Last modified: 14 Mar 2024 21:49

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Contributors

Author: Sara Benedi Lahuerta ORCID iD

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