Can LTD kick someone off for not being able to quit smoking

Disability Insurance
1

I am asking this for a friend who is currently on LTD.
Can my disability kick me off if I am unable to quit smoking as required from my surgeon to proceed with surgery. ???
Her surgeon will not consider her a candidate for surgery unless she quits smoking. If she does manage to quit, then she goes back on the list for surgery and can take up to a year for her back surgery to get done. Thanks

2

I don’t think so, as long as she is making a good faith effort to quit. It is an addiction and addiction is considered a disease.

I would talk to my family doctor about whether there are any medications or programs that might help her, or whether transitioning to vaping might be a good intermediate step. In BC we have a publicly funded smoking cessation program: Get help quitting tobacco - Province of British Columbia

If her province doesn’t have one, the federal government also has some resources: https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/campaigns/quit-smoking.html

And I would keep a log of the things I tried to show that my efforts are sincere.

I would remind myself that it’s not all or nothing to earn a health benefit. While quitting entirely is best, each individual cigarette or even individual puff that I don’t inhale will be a little bit better for me.

And then I would give myself a little hug and remind myself that it takes the average person between 6 and 10 attempts to quit smoking, so each time I fail, I’m one step closer to having quit.

3

My short answer would be yes. The long answer is more complicated. But generally speaking, all people have a duty to mitigate their losses. This means following reasonable medical advice and getting reasonable treatment. If this is a situation where the surgery would allow a person to return to work then there is a major requirement for the person to get the surgery if there are no unusual risks.

I take Caro’s point about smoking being an addiction. For you to be successful in saying you can’t quit smoking, you would have to show you were to extraordinary lengths for treatment. You would need to have an addictions specialist say it is not possible for you to quit, etc. Realistically I think that would be very hard to do.

David Brannen

Disability Lawyer with Resolute Legal

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