Why work when you are ill?

Summary:

Health and social care secretary Matt Hancock recently asked why people go to work while ill, putting their colleagues at risk of infection.

On 16 January 2021, the UK death toll from COVID-19 topped 90,000¹. That same day, 37,548 NHS hospital beds were occupied by a COVID-19 patient, with 3,634–4,550 daily admissions in the preceding week, putting intense pressure on NHS staff¹. There is no single reason why the latest wave of the pandemic has hit so hard, but mixed messages last summer and autumn, about getting people ‘back to the office’, can’t have helped. On 27 August, The Telegraph quoted government ministers as saying that ‘working from home will make people more vulnerable to being sacked’². Three months later, …

Dr John Ballard – Editor, Occupational Health [at Work]

Author: Ballard J

Tags absence COVID-19 pandemic sickness absence

Occupational Health at Work February/March 2021 (vol. 17/5) pp03

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