On October 29, 2019, railway operator Burlington Northern Santa
Fe Railway Company ("BNSF") prevailed before the United States Court of
Appeals for the Seventh Circuit – which covers Illinois,
Indiana, and Wisconsin – in a case in which the company
argued that its refusal to hire an obese candidate due to an
unacceptably high risk that the applicant would develop certain
obesity-related medical conditions incompatible with the position
sought did not violate the Americans with Disabilities Act
("ADA").
Ronald Shell applied for a job with BNSF as a machine operator
position. Per its standard practice when the applied-for position
is safety-sensitive, as was the heavy equipment operator position
sought by Shell, BNSF required him to undergo a medical
examination. During the medical examination, the examiner
determined that Shell's body mass index ("BMI") was
47. BNSF had a practice of refusing to hire individuals with a BMI
higher than 40 for safety-sensitive
