University of Dayton law professor Jeannette Cox is making national headlines with her proposal that pregnant women should be covered under the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Cox said she wants to see the workplace reinvented to include a larger scope of people. Her paper, "Pregnancy as a 'disability' and Americans with Disabilities Act of 2008," will be published in March, but is available on the Social Science Research Network's website.

"I think the strongest reaction has been from a feminist perspective, because they're concerned with linking pregnancy to disability," Cox said. "Disability shouldn't be considered a negative thing. People who are deaf make wonderful employees if they have the proper accommodations."

The Americans with Disabilities Act was amended in 2008 to include individuals with many minor and short-term disabilities, according to the United States Justice Department website. These disabilities are comparable to pregnancy, Cox said.

"According to [Equal Opportunity Employment Commission] regulations issued in 2011, the amended ADA requires employers to accommodate persons who experience shortness of breath and fatigue when walking distances that most people could walk without experiencing such effects,'" Cox wrote in a Jan. 10 guest column for CNN.com.

A 1994 Supreme Court case states that pregnancy is the natural consequence of a properly functioning reproductive system, and therefore cannot be considered a disability. Impairment is a prerequisite for disability under the law, and since pregnancy is a natural function, it can't be considered a disability.

Cox said she picked up interest in the issue when she noticed many accommodations the ADA makes for minor and short-term disabilities like back pain, fatigue or dehydration.

"Victoria Serednyj, a nursing home activity director, lost her job because her pregnancy interfered with her ability to lift heavy tables," according to Cox's CNN.com article. "Her employer terminated her employment even though lifting tables 'took up a small part, roughly five to 10 minutes' of her day and her co-workers volunteered to perform this task."

Cox said she believes the pregnancy consideration would benefit women's rights and disabled persons' rights in the workplace. She said rather than disability meaning an "internal impairment," she believes the ADA should instead reexamine the body's reaction to the structure of the workplace.

Natalie Hudson, a UD political science assistant professor, said she has done research in gender studies, human rights and women's activism. She said considering pregnancy as a disability is an improper way to confront the issue of pregnancy discrimination in the workplace.

"I think in the short term it's a really good thing but in the long term it doesn't challenge societal views of child rearing, pregnancy or childcare in the workplace," Hudson said. "It makes a woman less than she can fully be and I would argue that pregnancy makes a woman more than one individual could ever fully be."

She said policy should attack workplace pregnancy discrimination separately from disability.

Hudson said she's been pregnant twice in the last five years as a full-time tenured faculty member and has had a very positive experience. She said UD's maternity leave policy and the lack of physical demands her job requires allowed her to accommodate herself.

"I was very uncomfortable while I was pregnant," Hudson said. "But for me there's not much manual labor because I do a lot at a computer and a desk."

Hudson said some of the alterations she made to her job while pregnant were drinking water more frequently and sitting in the front of the classroom while teaching, rather than walking around, if she needed to.

Cox is also a mother and said she had a very positive experience while pregnant in her workplace.

Cox will present her paper during UD Disabilities Awareness week on Feb. 17.