Rising sick leave numbers will cost Britain £66 billion

The resulting rise in sick leave will cost the UK £66 billion by the end of the decade, insurer Zurich has warned.

Absenteeism among employees According to Zurich and the Center for Economics and Business Research (CEBR), chronic diseases cost the economy £32.7 billion last year.

This cost is forecast to double to £66.3 billion by 2030. as more people are forced to take longer sick leave.

Peter Hamilton from Zurich said: «It's like an economic time bomb that simply can't be ignored any longer.»

It comes amid growing political alarm over a surge in sick leave and a growing number of Britons being forced out of the job market altogether for health reasons in the wake of Covid.

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has launched a series of «carrot and stick» initiatives to boost the UK's workforce and could announce further measures in next week's Spring Budget.

According to the Office for National Statistics, around 2.8 million people say they are unable to work due to chronic health problems.

However, Zurich and Cebr estimate that a further 10.3 million Britons were employed but facing long-term health problems, up 300,000 from 2022.

The ONS reported that 185.6 million working days were lost due to illness. or injuries in 2022, which is a record high. Many of them are people suffering from problems such as mental health problems and back problems.

Zurich estimates that the number of working days lost due to absence among people with long-term health problems has risen to 112.5 million last year, i.e. from 104.9 million in 2022.

Over the past five years, this figure has increased by more than a fifth.

Almost one in three workers had a chronic health problem in the past year, according to compared to every fourth in 2017.

< p>According to the study, on the current trajectory, this figure could rise to two in five workers by 2023.

According to a survey of 1,000 workers who at some point were furloughed due to illness for a longer period Last year, Zurich found that poor mental health was the leading reason for absence from work.

About 44% of those surveyed cited this as a reason for absence from work, with musculoskeletal problems coming in second (14%).< /p >

The rise in long-term health problems has been blamed on the impact of Covid on people's education and mental health, as well as delays in the NHS that are causing people to struggle to access treatment.

Separate Resolution Foundation research published on Monday found that the growing mental health crisis among young people means those in their early 20s are now more likely to be written off sick than those in their early 40s.