There’s
nothing more selfish you can do than come to work sick. You may get a gold star
for showing your sniffling face at the office and soldiering through the
workday to prove your value – but everyone around you just gets sick. You’re an
inconsiderate work hazard. When people bring their infectious illness to work,
it spreads – and when sick people don’t have a financial incentive to show up
to work, fewer people get sick. The researchers studied US cities with paid
sick-leave mandates and looked for changes in flu rates after those mandates
went into effect. The cities that adopted paid sick-leave mandates in that time
frame saw flu cases drop by about 5% after their laws took effect. For a city
of 100,000 people, that comes out to 100 fewer infections per week.
You see
people who are at the workplace sneezing and potentially infectious. That’s how
diseases spread. For most of us, staring at a screen through the fog of illness
is torture, and does nothing to help us recover. Yet 3 million people, or 2% of
the US population, bring their ailments to work each week – a phenomenon the
researchers dubbed. Many do so because of financial pressures; nearly a third
of workers have no access to paid sick leave, need to stop making excuses for
showing up at work sick. Almost half of workers say they worry work will pile
up if they stay home sick. People who find their jobs engaging also have a hard
time staying home.
But those
diligent workers aren’t just showing their commitment, they’re also showering their
coworkers with germs; the modern open office plan is a breeding ground for
contagious illnesses. Worst of all, people tend to come to the office at the
beginning of an illness, when they’re at their most contagious but still
feeling well enough to get a little work done. Employers, for their part,
should encourage ailing workers to stay home.
