Disability discrimination claims under Obamacare carry a four-year statute of limitations

Did you know that Obamacare includes provisions that allow people to sue over certain forms of disability discrimination? It does. The Affordable Care Act does many things, but it also allows for certain lawsuits. Like this one. The question here is what is the statute of limitations. The answer is four years.

The case is Vega-Ruiz v. Northwell Health, issued on March 24. Plaintiff is hearing-impaired. She accompanied her brother to the hospital and requested a Spanish-speaking sign-language interpreter to help fulfill her duties as her brother's proxy as he underwent surgery. She was denied the sign-language interpreter and instead given someone who communicated to her through written notes and lip reading. 

The case does not ask whether plaintiff has a case under the ACA. The question is whether she waited too late to bring this lawsuit, three years and three months after the incident. The district court dismissed the case, holding the statute of limitations is three years because her case was made possible by the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, a disability discrimination statute which carries that deadline. 

The Court of Appeals (Newman and Pooler) says this is really an ACA case, not a Rehabilitation Act case. The ACA does not articulate a statute of limitations. In the face of such an omission, the courts look to a law that Congress passed in 1990, 28 U.S.C. 1658(a), which provides a catch-all statute of limitations for laws that don't have one. The deadline under Section 1658(a) is four years for any act of Congress that was enacted after December 1, 1990.

The Court takes the time to examine the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Rehabilitation Act and the Affordable Care Act to determine what statute really applies in this case for purposes of the statute of limitations. It looks like the ACA provides greater rights to plaintiffs than the ADA and the Rehabilitation Act. And, the Court holds that ACA plaintiffs have a different case than those brought under the ADA. That means the plaintiff has a four-year statute of limitations, and her case is timely.