Professionals get sick more frequently in 2013

DAK-health evaluation: Rise in colds in the first half of the year

08/14/2013

The long winter has left its mark on health: in the first half of 2013, Germans were more frequently ill than in the previous year. This has resulted in an evaluation of all sick leave of insured persons of DAK health in the first six months. Compared to the same period of the previous year, the sickness rate increased from 3.8 percent to 4.1 percent.

The bad weather is likely to have played a crucial role in the increase in lost days. This is shown by the fact that this year a striking number of people have died because of colds on the job. The number of respiratory infections increased dramatically. While cough, bronchitis and pneumonia caused only 16.8 percent of all days off in the first half of 2012, their share so far this year is 22.3 percent.

More working people are sick
All in all, more employees remained at home due to illness than in the first half of 2012. 38.7 percent of all employed persons have taken their sick leave at least once, compared with 34.6 percent the year before. The illnesses lasted for an average of 11.6 days.

Mental complaints are the third leading cause of missing days
After respiratory infections, diseases of the musculoskeletal system (e.g., back pain) and mental illnesses (e.g., depression) have been responsible for most absenteeism in the job. These three diagnostic groups alone account for more than half of all sick leave days. In the eastern federal states, working people were more frequently on sick leave. The average sickness rate in the East was 5.0 percent, in the West only 3.9 percent.

For the analysis of the sick leave, the data of 2.7 million gainfully employed insured persons of the health insurance DAK-Gesundheit were evaluated by the IGES Institute in Berlin. (Pm)