According to health and safety services ArboNed and HumanCapitalCare, a relatively large number of people were temporarily out of work, especially in healthcare, industry, education and construction. Absenteeism due to illness came to 4.9%. This is slightly lower than the 5.1% in November. “Probably because of the lockdown and Christmas holidays, more people were already at home,” says Jurriaan Penders, company doctor and director of medical affairs at HumanCapitalCare.
Now that the holidays and lockdown are over, he thinks absenteeism will rise again. “The number of corona infections remains high. And despite the fact that we become less ill due to the omicron variant, workers still fall out for a few days.”
According to the occupational health and safety services, absenteeism was lowest at financial institutions and in business services, which often involve office work. ArboNed and HumanCapitalCare are part of the HumanTotalCare group and jointly work for approximately one million workers.
28 days
Interpolis, part of Achmea, has also seen a sharp rise in absenteeism in recent months. In December, the insurer even received more than 3,500 sick reports from employers who are customers of the insurer. This number may increase because notifications for December can still be submitted.
But the number is already more than half the number of reports reported in December over the past three years. The average duration of absenteeism was 28 days. That is also significantly longer than before.
Earlier this week, several large Dutch companies, for example KPN and ING, already announced that there were more corona infections among their staff. However, the higher absenteeism has not yet led to serious problems.
Supermarkets have already sounded the alarm, because of the strict quarantine rules. They are experiencing increasing scheduling problems due to the loss of personnel who have to be quarantined.