Obese workers twice as likely to be off sick
Increase in sick notes reveals that obesity is stifling British economy, research suggests
Obese workers are up to twice as likely to take time off sick, a study has found. The research – the first to provide a detailed breakdown of the impact of weight on productivity – shows how soaring obesity rates are driving a “sick note” culture and stifling the economy. Experts said Britain’s record was among the worst of 28 countries, with six in 10 adults overweight or obese. Findings from the mass study were published as the UK faces record levels of long-term sickness.
OBESE workers are up to twice as likely to take time off sick, a landmark study has found.
The research – the first to provide a detailed breakdown of the impact of weight on productivity – shows how soaring obesity rates are driving a “sick note” culture and stifling the economy.
Experts warned that Britain’s record was among the worst of 28 countries examined, with six in 10 adults overweight or obese.
Findings from the mass study, which examined the habits of 123,000 workers across Europe, were published as the UK faces record levels of long-term sickness.
Researchers found that the most severely obese were 2.5 times more likely to have been off work for a week during the past year with sickness, compared with those of a healthy weight.
Even those who were overweight, but not obese, were 22 per cent more likely than slimmer workers to have taken at least seven sick days.
Last month, Rishi Sunak called for an end to “sick note culture,” warning against “over-medicalising the everyday challenges and worries of life” as he unveiled welfare reforms.
Latest figures from the Office for National Statistics show 2.8 million people on long-term sick leave, up from 2.1 million before the pandemic, with about £50 billion spent on sickness benefits for people of working age.
Critics said the Government drive cannot succeed without drastic action to combat obesity, which is linked to a host of long-term health problems.
They said the UK was facing “very, very profound consequences” from becoming the “sick man of Europe” precisely because of a failure to tackle big public health threats, of which obesity was the greatest. The study, presented at the European Congress on Obesity in Venice, found that the more people weigh, the more sick days they take.
Britain was among the worst of all countries analysed – with separate research showing it has the third highest levels of obesity across Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) nations.
The research is the first to provide a detailed breakdown of how sick days vary according to weight, revealing how the obesity epidemic is damaging productivity and driving people out of the workforce.
The authors said obesity-related health issues such as back pain, arthritis or heart disease stop people going to work and means people are “increasingly excluded from contributing to society”.
It comes as separate UK data show long-term sickness is now the main reason for women being out of the workforce, with an extra 500,000 women now economically inactive for this reason in the past five years.
In total, 1.54 million women fall into this category – the highest figure since records began. Much of the growth is the result of conditions such as back pain that are driven by excess weight. The new study found that overall, women were more likely than men to be off work sick.
More than one in four adults in the UK are obese, with the costs of excess weight estimated to cost the UK economy an estimated £98bn every year.
The new study, led by the Health Economics and Health Policy Research Group, Institute for Advanced Studies,
Vienna, Austria looked at national survey data from a representative sample of 122,598 people, representing a population of 147 million working-age people across 26 European countries.
A government spokesman said: “Obesity costs the NHS around £6.5 billion a year, and we are taking firm action to promote healthier options and reduce levels of obesity.