Fired While on Medical Leave: What Ontario Law Says

Few terminations are more legally loaded than letting someone go while they are on a medical or disability leave. Employers often underestimate just how much protection the law gives a sick or injured employee. Being dismissed during a leave does not automatically make it unlawful, but it shifts a lot of scrutiny onto the employer, and the remedies can be significant.

Can you be fired while on medical leave in Ontario?

Not because of your medical condition. The Human Rights Code protects employees from being dismissed or treated adversely because of a disability, which includes most illnesses and injuries that keep you off work. An employer can dismiss an employee who happens to be on leave for a reason that has nothing to do with the leave, but it carries the burden of showing the leave played no part in the decision, and the timing makes that hard.

The duty to accommodate, to the point of undue hardship

Before an employer can fairly part ways with a disabled employee, it must try to accommodate. That can mean a modified return-to-work plan, adjusted duties, a graduated schedule, or time to recover. The employer only escapes this duty if accommodation would cause undue hardship, a high standard measured by real cost and health-and-safety factors, not mere inconvenience. Skipping the accommodation process is one of the most common employer mistakes.

The duty is procedural as well as substantive: the employer has to actually inquire and assess before acting. In Lane v. ADGA Group Consultants Inc. (2007 HRTO 34), an employee with bipolar disorder was dismissed without any real assessment of accommodation while in a vulnerable pre-manic state; the Tribunal awarded 35,000 dollars plus 10,000 dollars and stressed the employer's failure to inquire. In Strudwick v. Applied Consumer & Clinical Evaluations Inc. (2016 ONCA 520), an employee who suddenly went deaf faced an employer that refused every accommodation request and made her working life harder; the Court of Appeal upheld a wrongful dismissal award and raised the human rights damages to 40,000 dollars.

When is it discrimination?

It is discrimination when your disability or medical leave was a factor (not even the only factor) in the decision to dismiss you. Common red flags include being let go shortly after starting a leave, after disclosing a diagnosis, or after requesting accommodation; being replaced while off sick; or being told the company "needs someone reliable." The decision does not have to be openly hostile to be unlawful.

Two recent cases show how directly this bites when the timing lines up. In Irvine v. Seniorscare Corporation (2020 HRTO 339), an employee of nearly four years was terminated immediately after telling the employer about a temporary disability; the Tribunal awarded 35,000 dollars for injury to dignity. In Rombough v. Exclusive Cooling Ltd. (2026 HRTO 818), a seasonal worker had a heart attack and the employer terminated him without exploring accommodation and cancelled his benefits during the medical crisis, drawing another 35,000-dollar award. The through-line is the same: firing on the heels of a disability disclosure, without a genuine accommodation attempt, is what turns a termination into discrimination.

What about "frustration of contract"?

Employers sometimes argue that a long disability has made the employment contract impossible to continue, which is called frustration of contract. It is a real doctrine, but a narrow one. It generally applies only where the absence is lengthy and there is no reasonable prospect of return in the foreseeable future, and even then the employee is still owed their minimum ESA entitlements. It is not a shortcut for ending a sick employee's job, and it is often raised wrongly.

What can you claim?

If you were dismissed in connection with a disability or leave, your claim can include your usual wrongful dismissal severance (common law reasonable notice) plus human rights damages for the discrimination itself, including compensation for injury to dignity. That combination often produces a result well above an ordinary severance package. Strudwick is a good illustration of the stacking: on top of 24 months of pay in lieu of notice, the Court of Appeal added 40,000 dollars in human rights damages and 70,000 dollars in aggravated damages, plus punitive damages, because of how the employer treated her. The worse the employer's conduct, the more the extras grow.

What should you do if you were fired on medical leave?

1. 1.Write down the timeline: when you went on leave, what you disclosed, what accommodation you requested, and when you were let go.
2. 2.Keep medical notes, accommodation requests, and all related emails.
3. 3.Do not sign a release; these cases are often worth more than the first offer.
4. 4.Get advice quickly. Termination tied to a disability is one of the strongest positions an employee can have.

If your dismissal happened during probation, see your rights on probation. To understand the severance side, read severance pay in Ontario, or get a free review of your situation.

About the Author

Omar Haddad

Legal Writer, Mirza Law

Omar Haddad is a legal writer at Mirza Law in Toronto. He writes about termination, medical and disability leave, and what the law protects when an employee is let go.

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