California law has the back of new and expectant mothers who need workplace accommodations during pregnancy or time and space to breastfeed after giving birth. By following the laws, employers protect the moms-to-be and babies. Unfortunately, when employers disregard their legal obligations, the consequences for women and their babies can be huge – premature delivery, back injuries, undernourished babies, even stress-related miscarriage.
A recent article in the Huffington Post exemplifies the suffering one employee experienced when Albertson’s failed to accommodate her most basic requests for accommodations: she delivered prematurely and her newborn died. In a recent blog post detailing this tragic case, the public interest law firm, Public Justice, calls for action at the federal level to extend the types of protections available under California law across the nation. Blogger and Public Justice staff attorney Claire Prestel touts the recommendations of an important recent report by the National Women’s Law Center and A Better Balance —
So here’s a newsflash that shouldn’t be news to anyone: More and more pregnant women are working, working closer to their due dates, and providing essential income and benefits for their families. This means that if we are going to get serious about restoring the middle class, part of our effort must go to protecting these women so they can support their families. The NWLC/ABB report outlines concrete steps that can and should be taken right now, including guidance the EEOC can issue without presidential or congressional action.
Another recent blog post from Public Justice senior attorney Victoria Ni, The Facts of Life, describes the long struggle women have experienced to secure their right to breastfeed their babies while supporting their families by working. In California, the law was amended this year to ensure that discrimination based on sex specifically included breastfeeding. Despite this, many women continue to experience difficulties trying to pump breast milk during work hours. Unfortunately, even a day or two of interrupted pumping can have significant and ongoing effects on a mother’s ability to breastfeed their newborn. While certainly not as extreme as the death of a newborn, the inability to supply one’s child with breast milk can have serious long-term effects on the health of one’s baby.
Often the accommodations female employees need are as simple and obvious as not requiring a pregnant woman to lift heavy items or to allow a woman with gestational diabetes the ability to eat regular snacks during work so her blood sugar can remain stable. For women who wish to breastfeed, the accommodation is usually as straightforward as providing them with a private space (not a bathroom stall) and time to pump breast milk.
In view of how long and hard employees had to fight to establish these reasonable and simple laws, it should perhaps not come as a surprise that employers continue to fight long and hard to resist following them. But resistance to change does not justify the serious consequences to women and the long-term harms suffered by infants, all of which can be prevented in California through enforcement of the legal protections.
About Sarah Schlehr
Sarah B. Schlehr is the founder of The Schlehr Law Firm, P.C. Her firm focuses on representing employees who are discriminated against because of pregnancy or for taking a leave of absence. Her firm also represents veterans who have been discriminated against for taking military leave. She is a graduate of Harvard Law School, Brigham Young University, Gerry Spence’s Trial Lawyers College, and the Strauss Institutes’ Program on Mediating the Litigated Case.