Can a person be fired for being ill?
I was fairly new to my job, had started on 12/20/2012. We had a three week training course and then was placed on the phones to take client inquiries. During that time, I missed a day of work on 1/18/2013 due to a large snowstorm hitting my area and injuring myself while on my way to the bus stop for work, and then on 1/25/2013 I came down with the flu. I ended up having to go to the emergency room that day and spent several hours there, into the next day, being treated for high fever and dehydration. I was given a medical excuse by the attending physician for that day, Monday, through Thursday, and was released to return to work Friday. I called every day two hours before my shift to inform my manager and the attendance telephone line that I would be absent due to my illness, offered to scan and email, fax or have someone physically bring my note from the hospital and the attending physician, along with my discharge papers showing the time that I went into the emergency room and what time I was released. On Thursday, my manager and my human resources manager called me to inform me that due to excessive absences in my first 90 days of employment, I was being terminated without chance of rehire. The policy as it was given to us in our training class when we started was that if we were sick and we were deemed contagious we were to under no circumstances come into work, as we worked in an office with many other people and illness, especially something like the flu, could be spread rapidly. The doctor said that while I would be better off staying out until next week, I shouldn't be contagious anymore past Thursday given the timeline of my illness. Given that I have medical documentation of my treatment, was in compliance with the attendance policy as stated in the employee handbook's revised edition, and the absences, because of being for the same thing, should have been grouped together but were not, is my termination legal? If it is, is there any legal recourse I could have to at least get my eligibility for rehire reinstated?