Home working fuels long-term illness with rise in back pain

Makeshift desks and offices blamed as the number of people off work soars following the pandemic

WORKING from home is fuelling a rise in long-term illness as uncomfortable desk set-ups prompt a spate of back and neck problems, official statisticians have suggested.

Some 262,000 people were out of work because of neck and back pain between April and June this year – a rise of 30pc from before the pandemic.

“It’s possible that increased homeworking has given rise to these kinds of conditions,” said Hugh Stickland from the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

An extra 62,000 people have become economically inactive – meaning they were neither working nor looking for work – because of neck and back pain since before the pandemic.

People aged 35 to 49 saw the largest increase in long-term sickness linked to neck and back problems, rising by 39pc. For younger people, it rose by 12pc.

A previous survey by the Institute for Employment Studies found that over half of people working from home during lockdowns had experienced new neck and back pains as the impact of makeshift offices on kitchen tables or sofas took its toll on people’s bodies.

The ONS said the number of people off work because of long-term sickness had risen by 500,000 since early 2019.

Back and neck pain was the second biggest cause of new long-term sickness. The biggest driver was “other health problems or disabilities”, a category that covers problems including long Covid, although this is believed to be a relatively small contributor.

A total of 2.5m were classified as longterm sick between June and August. While over half of these are older Britons, the largest relative increase was among young people.

More than half a million 16 to 34-yearolds are unable to work as a result of long-term sickness, up by 140,000 since the pandemic.

Among this group, about 200,000 are dealing with mental health issues – 30,000 more than before the pandemic. Problems include phobias, anxiety and depression.

The retail, transportation and storage industries had the highest rates of longterm sickness.

The shrinking UK workforce is one of the most pressing challenges facing the economy, as labour shortages hold back businesses and push up inflation through higher wages.

Sharlene Mcgee, policy manager at the Health Foundation, said: “The Government must recognise the drivers and scale of the recent rise in economic inactivity. This cannot be achieved by solely focusing on the unemployed; people out of the labour market should be a priority.”