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There are a lot of them right now: sick leave
Photo: Z1003 Jens Büttner/ dpa
The sick leave among employed BKK members reached a new record value of 5.7 percent in the first half of 2022.
The umbrella organization of company health insurance companies (BKK) reports that absenteeism has never been anywhere near as high since 2011.
In the past few years, the corresponding values in the same period were significantly lower at an average of 4.17 to 5.1 percent.
According to the information, the main reason for the high value is the sudden increase in absenteeism in connection with respiratory diseases.
At 1.16 percent, the value for the first half of 2022 for such diseases is even higher than the 1.02 percent of 2018. According to the BKK, "the most severe flu wave of the last decade" drove the number up.
High absenteeism in normal respiratory diseases
The second quarter of the current year is particularly noticeable with unusually high absenteeism in connection with normal respiratory diseases.
With an average of 0.96 percent, values are more than twice as high compared to the same period in the pre-pandemic years - 0.41 percent to 0.45 percent.
Corona diseases, on the other hand, only play a subordinate role: In the first half of 2022, these were responsible for an average of just 4.3 percent of all days of incapacity to work per month, while general respiratory diseases accounted for more than every fifth such day at 20.3 percent.
The BKK umbrella organization represents the political interests of 68 company health insurance funds and four state associations with nine million insured persons.
"There will probably not be much time this year to take a deep breath for employees and companies, as the 'summer break' has made possible in recent years," explained the chairman of the BKK umbrella organization, Franz Knieps.
It is therefore all the more important that the necessary precautions for the coming autumn or winter are taken now at the latest.
This is the only way to prevent a further increase in sick leave and thus staff shortages.
mamk/AFP
