Safety

Working at all cost is ill-advised

OSHA Healthcare Connection, January 2, 2007

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Dragging yourself to work when you have the flu can hurt your employer more than if you call in sick. Presenteeism, the opposite of absenteeism, is when ailing employees force themselves to go to work, and it is on the rise in U.S. workplaces, according to The New York Times, December 22.

While altruism was the commonly-accepted explanation for presenteeism, experts now believe that employer pressure and the absence of paid sick time is what motivates workers to report when ill.

One third of workers feel pressure to report to work even when sick, according to a survey by the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases. Another survey by Cornell University found that ill but on-the-job workers cost their companies more in lost productivity than from being absent.



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