French employees went to work more than one in four sick days, a phenomenon of “ presenteeism in the event of illness ” accentuated by certain working conditions, according to a study by the Ministry of Labor published on Wednesday 5 August.
According to this study, based on 19,200 responses to a survey conducted from October 2015 to June 2016, “ employees report an average of eleven days of illness which resulted in eight days of absence from work ”, specifies the Management studies and statistics (Dares). “ More than one in four days of illness (27%) resulted in presenteeism, a practice which consists of going to work while being ill, ” notes the Dares.
At the European level, this phenomenon is particularly marked in France, where 62% of employees had at least one day of presenteeism in the event of illness in 2015, against 42% of employees in the whole of the European Union, according to a survey. European Union on working conditions.
Working conditions
" The propensity to presenteeism (...) varies firstly according to the state of health of the employees: the higher the annual number of sick days, the lower the share of presenteeism days in the company " , explains the Dares.
Employees who only report one or two sick days in the year spend 83% of those days at work, against 21% for those with more than fifteen days of sickness.
Working conditions also play an important role in the propensity of employees to come to work while being sick. Thus, “ employees who report bad relations with their hierarchy, intense work or a feeling of economic insecurity tend to spend at work a greater part of their sick days ,” notes the Dares. “ When faced with a significant demand for work (in terms of intensity, quantity or working time), or when there is a lack of means to do his job correctly (...), the employee could be discouraged from s 'to be absent by the prospect of an even greater amount of work when she returns from illness or by the pressure of colleagues who would fall back on unrealized tasks , ”she analyzes.