Professions that account for more 'sick days' off may surprise you.
When choosing a profession, there’s a multitude of factors to consider including the day-to-day duties, salary, benefits, etc. But another factor that is overlooked is that a job might make you sick, more often. And we mean sick enough that you need to spend a fair amount of time away from your place of employment.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ recent occupational injuries and illnesses report, these are the occupations where people take the most ‘sick days’ each year. Some of the professions that make the list might surprise you, while others aren’t nearly as shocking.
Tobacco and beverages manufacturers
While you wouldn’t necessarily associate manufacturing as a particularly sickly profession, more than five per cent of employees required time off due to an illness in 2009.
Out of 100 employers, 5.3 of those had an illness that required days away from work.
Air transportation (private)
Working for a private airline may mean your job is rife with illness. This category includes baggage handlers, air hostesses and the thousands of other workers responsible for getting us from Point A to Point B safely.
According to the report, five per cent of workers had to take time off work due to illness (or five out of 100 employees surveyed).
Transit workers for local government
If you consider how many passengers your bus driver likely comes into contact with on a daily basis, this stat makes sense. Five per cent of transit workers need a few days off work annually because of sickness.
Justice workers and public safety employees (including firefighters and police officers)
Again, where there is frequent and prolonged contact with the public, there seems to be an association with germs leading to days off work. However, the stats for this group that includes firefighters and police officers isn’t as high as you might think — only 4.1 workers out of 100 needed to take time off due to illness in 2009.
Private nurses and caretakers
Despite working with ill and frail patients on a daily basis, the number of cases where private nurses had to take days off is much lower than you might expect. Only 4.7 nurses and caretakers out of 100 had to stay home to recover from illness.
Civil construction workers
Workers who perform heavy construction for local governments actually tend to take more time off for illness than even nurses — 4.8 per cent take time off each year, compared to the slight lower stat of 4.7 for private nurses.
Public hospital workers
This statistic doesn’t exactly drop jaws. For non-medical staffers who work in state-run hospitals, the shifts can be long and stressful, and dealing with ailing masses unsurprisingly leads to more sick days. About 4.8 people out of 100 have to take time away from work each year.
Public facility nurses and caretakers
With the highest number of them all, nurses who work in government-run facilities definitely take the top slot for ‘the most sickly profession.’ With 7.4 cases out of 100 requiring days away from work, the numbers tell a tale of long hours, stressful conditions and potential under-staffing in some situations.