u/JKmelda

I keep seeing this on this sub and I’m very confused about this. People say that under the ADA a person who passes out or has seizures cannot legally be in public by themselves because they can’t be in control of their dog when they pass out or have a seizure. I want to understand if this is a correct interpretation of the ADA or not. (I want to be clear that I’m simply asking for clarification in this post. If these things are illegal I’m in no way intending to advise people to stretch the law. I’m just trying to sort out what seems contradictory in my mind.)

Here’s my confusion: It’s been industry standard by well respected programs in the United States for decades to place seizure response dogs that are intended to be handled independently in public by their handlers seizures. Is this industry standard by ethical programs in the wrong, and if so, why wasn’t the DOJ addressed this?

Also the DOJ gives this example of a service dog task: “A person who has epilepsy may have a dog that is trained to detect the onset of a seizure and then help the person remain safe during the seizure.” Meaning the DOJ sees seizure response dogs as legitimate service dogs. If this is such a legally problematic task, then why does the DOJ use it as one of the limited examples of what a service dog task could be?

I understand that the ADA requires a service dog to be under control at all times. The Department of Justice states this on ADA.gov “A service animal must be under the control of its handler. Under the ADA, service animals must be harnessed, leashed, or tethered…” Wouldn’t a dog that’s tethered be under control by this definition?

Could someone please help me understand this?