What protections are afforded on the basis of pregnancy?

The Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978 amended Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1978 to clarify that discrimination on the basis of sex includes pregnancy and childbirth. Women affected by pregnancy or childbirth must be treated the same for all employment-related purposes as other persons not so affected, but similar in their ability or inability to work. This clearly established pregnant women's right to continue working.

What if a job presents a risk to the fetus? Individuals who can perform the essential functions of a job must be considered eligible for employment, regardless of the presence of workplace hazards to fetuses. Policies that exclude members of one sex from a workplace for the purpose of protecting fetuses cannot be justified under Title VII.

Related employment practices that may also be unlawful include transferring an employee to a lower-paying job not involving exposure, refusal to transfer an employee to an available position for which she is qualified, or refusal to permit an employee to perform modified assignments in her existing job.

Does a woman have a right to reinstatement after the birth of her child? Title VII does not require an employer to hold open for any specified time the job of an employee on leave for pregnancy-related reasons (but realize that the Family and Medical Leave Act provides for 12 weeks of unpaid job- protected leave). However, the employer may not treat her less favorably than it treats other employees seeking to return to work after comparable absences for nonpregnancy reasons.

Must accommodations be made for pregnancy? Employers are required to accommodate pregnant employees in the same ways that they would accommodate other employees with temporary disabilities. Title VII's mandate that males and females be treated similarly can not justify deliberately giving a pregnant employee an assignment that she could not and should not perform simply because her employer wanted to treat her the same as males or female employees who are not pregnant.

There is no outright requirement under federal law that an employer provide an alternative job for an employee who, for pregnancy-related reasons, is unable to perform the functions of her job. The provision of modified tasks or alternative assignments is dictated by how other temporarily disabled employees are treated. State law, however, may create such an obligation. Be sure to check State Laws for the Fair Employment Practice laws that apply in your state(s).

The Americans with Disability Act generally does not apply to pregnancy because it is not the result of a physiological disorder. But there may be pregnancy-related ADA claims when there are complications with the pregnancy or the employer regards the individual as disabled.

The Family and Medical Leave Act allows employees to take intermittent or reduced schedule leave for planned medical treatment. Employers may require an employee who has requested such leave to transfer temporarily to an available alternative position if:

• the employee is qualified for the alternative position;

• the position has equivalent pay and benefits, and

• the alternative position better accommodates recurring periods of leave than the employee's regular position.

Is a woman who leaves work due to pregnancy entitled to unemployment compensation? Not necessarily. States that deny unemployment compensation to all persons who leave work for reasons not causally connected to the work of the employer do not discriminate on the basis of pregnancy just because women who leave their jobs for pregnancy are not given unemployment compensation, the US Supreme Court has ruled. Pregnant women are not singled out for unfavorable treatment under such laws, the Court noted, and nothing in the federal Unemployment Tax Act mandates preferential treatment of pregnant women.

Do the nondiscrimination rules also apply to abortion? Yes, the nondiscrimination principles in federal law applicable to pregnancy apply equally to a woman who has had or is planning to have an abortion. Protection from abortion bias can also be found in the sex discrimination laws of many states, which explicitly reference abortion.

Are workers who oppose abortion also protected? Employee beliefs about abortion may impact on job rules or assignments because of an employer's obligation to accommodate religious beliefs. For example, a police officer who objects on religious grounds to standing guard outside an abortion clinic could be accommodated by providing him with the opportunity to transfer, without a reduction in pay or benefits, to a district that did not have an abortion clinic.

Many states protect health care workers who have moral objections to abortion. Such individuals may not be required to participate in abortion procedures or be discriminated against for their refusal to do so. State law generally requires that they provide their employer with a written statement indicating their opposition to abortion.