Ms Julie Stacey 1st v MSI Reproductive Choices 2nd Respondent: Nicola Moore 3rd Respondent: Richard Bentley DECISION FOLLOWING A PRELIMINARY HEARING — 2023

The claimant brought complaints across three claims, including disability discrimination, whistleblowing, health and safety detriment, victimisation, unfair dismissal and further disability discrimination. At the hearing on 25 July 2023 the claimant withdrew the health and safety detriment and indirect discrimination complaints, and the issue listed for the public preliminary hearing was whether she was a disabled person within the meaning of section 6 Equality Act 2010 by reason of Long COVID at the relevant times.

The tribunal found that the claimant contracted COVID in November 2020, was hospitalised, and thereafter continued to experience symptoms. It accepted her evidence as honest and reliable and found the documentary record consistent with her account, including the referral to the Long COVID clinic, the October 2021 clinic letter, emails with Nicola Moore in February and March 2022, occupational health material in June 2022, and Dr Catherine Yeo’s letter of 24 August 2023.

Applying section 6 Equality Act 2010, the statutory definition of substantial as more than minor or trivial, and the Goodwin/Sullivan four-stage approach, the tribunal held that the claimant had physical impairments, namely fatigue, breathlessness and brain fog. It found those impairments had an adverse effect on normal day-to-day activities including walking, socialising, remembering things, reading and writing, and housework, that the effects were substantial, and that they had lasted significantly longer than 12 months and were continuing. The tribunal therefore concluded that she was disabled at the material time, namely between January 2021 and October 2022.