WASHINGTON — Allergic to gluten? What about peanuts? Federal disabilities law may be able to help.
The Justice Department said in a recent settlement with a Massachusetts college that severe food allergies can be considered a disability under the law. That gives those who suffer from such allergies a new avenue in seeking menus that fit their diet. But some say it goes too far.
The decision leaves schools, restaurants and other places that serve food more exposed to legal challenges if they fail to honor requests for accommodations by people with food allergies.
Colleges and universities are especially vulnerable because they know their students and often require them to eat on campus, Eve Hill of the Justice Department’s civil rights division says. But a restaurant also could be liable if it blatantly ignored a customer’s request for certain foods and that person became ill, though that case might be harder to argue if the customer had just walked in off the street and was unknown to the restaurant, Hill says.
The settlement with Lesley University, reached last month but drawing little attention, will require the Cambridge institution to serve gluten-free foods and make other accommodations for students who have celiac disease. At least one student had complained to the federal government after the school would not exempt that student from a meal plan even though the student couldn’t eat the food.
“All colleges should heed this settlement and take steps to make accommodations,” says Alice Bast, president and founder of the National Foundation for Celiac Awareness. “To our community this is definitely a precedent.”
Under the agreement, Lesley University says it will not only provide gluten-free options in its dining hall but also allow students to pre-order, provide a dedicated space for storage and preparation to avoid contamination and train staff about food allergies.
“We are not saying what the general meal plan has to serve or not,” Hill says. “We are saying that when a college has a mandatory meal plan they have to be prepared to make reasonable modifications to that meal plan to accommodate students with disabilities.”
The agreement says that food allergies may constitute a disability under the Americans With Disabilities Act, if they are severe enough. The definition was made possible under 2009 amendments to the disability law that concerned episodic impairments that substantially limit activity.
Not everyone agrees.
Hans von Spakovsky, a fellow at the Heritage Foundation who worked in the civil rights division of the Justice Department under President George W. Bush, says the inclusion of food allergies is a major expansion of the disability law.
“I certainly encourage colleges and universities to work with students on this issue, but the fact that this is a federal case and the Justice Department is going to be deciding what kind of meals could be served in a dining hall is just absurd,” he says.
