Many employees work while sick

This flu season sees many office workers trudging into work sick and contagious instead of staying home and calling in sick.

By

Chad Brooks, BusinessNewsDaily

Thu, Nov 15 2012 at 2:09 PM

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Viruses & Diseases

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Employers are not doing a good job of encouraging workers to stay home when they are sick.

Nearly 80 percent of office workers recently surveyed said they come to work when they are sick, an increase of 20 percent over last year. For those who do initially stay home, more than two-thirds return to work despite still being contagious. That was the finding of the third annual Flu Season Survey from Staples.

It doesn't help that many workers are unaware of the different contagious periods for illnesses. The study revealed that 65 percent of employees feel it is only necessary to stay home between one and three days with the flu, when, in actuality, the flu virus can be contagious for one day before symptoms develop and up to seven days after becoming sick.

The top factor keeping employees from staying home sick is the need to get work done, even though a majority of workers said their average productivity level while ill was only around 50 percent.

The study points to dirty workplaces as one factor contributing to the ease of which germs are passed around the office. More than half of employees clean their desks just once a week or less, even though germs can live on surfaces for up to three days.

"We know that companies are already doing more with fewer resources, and flu season has the potential to impact productivity," said Lisa Hamblet, vice president for facility solutions at Staples Advantage, the business-to-business division of Staples. "Prevention is key."

The study was based on surveys of 150 office workers and 100 facility managers at organizations of all sizes across the U.S.

Follow Chad Brooks on Twitter @cbrooks76 or BusinessNewsDaily @BNDarticles. We're also on Facebook & Google+.

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Comment: 1

Dena Nov 16 2012 at 8:38 AM

These types of articles always leave me laughing until I pee!!! When are people going to finally get it- I'm not going to work sick because I want to. I'm going to work sick because I HAVE to if I want to keep my job!! Where I work, each day missed results in a write up. 3 write ups and I'm fired. If you're lucky enough to get a doctors note (because there is no way you are going to get a same day doctor's appt) it still doesn't matter. And I'm a nurse and work in a hospital!!!! There have been times

.... More

I've been sicker than the patients I'm caring for. I have held the heads of co workers while they vomited in the bathroom then worked with them minutes later while caring for a patient. But when you are the primary breadwinner and your job is constantly in jeopardy, then you go to work.

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