Is It Okay to Fire People Who Smoke?
Tony Newman wrote
Two years ago (2007), as part of their “wellness initiative,” the Cleveland Clinic stopped hiring smokers. When the Clinic’s CEO, Delos M. Cosgrove, was asked about the program for an article in last weekend’s New York Times Magazine, he said that if it were up to him, he would also stop hiring obese people as well.
Clearly, lifestyle decisions lead to huge medical and financial costs to both the hospital and the country. The logic, according to Mr. Cosgrove and others who justify not hiring smokers and people who are obese, is that punitive sanctions will coerce smokers and overweight folks to live healthier lives. Not hiring them or charging them more money for insurance, according to their logic, would effectively persuade people to change harmful health practices.
People knows smoking causes cancer but they still smoke. People knows eating fat rich food will cause obesity but they still eat. To know and not to do is not yet to know. Until a smoker or a fat person decide enough is enough and that something got to change, they will not be swayed by what others do or don’t do to them. It may be a noble act for a noble cause, however, I doubt Mr Delos M. Cosgrove has created any long lasting message to the smokers.
Perhaps a smoker will consider smoking less when the price for a puff keeps going up.
