To expect people ill with Covid stay home?

It's no different from a cold nowadays. If your ill stay off if you feel fine don't stay off

Are they unwell or not?

Surely they're not actually unwell if they're going to work and exercise classes?

I don't think people will isolate if they are fine.

It's a cold... Workplaces and schools expect people to carry on and work through it. That's life.

Because of people choosing to come close to me knowing they're having UR illness, I've had to have life changing surgery on my nose postponed. I'm still not well yet and I'm praying it'll be clear in a month. Or surgery will be pushed back again. Been sick now for a month!

I hope everyone who's got something like this gets well soon and please stay indoors as much as possible!

How do you determine whether someone is taking the piss or is genuinely unwell? People can get ill multiple times a year, and recurrent short-term sickness absence doesn’t automatically mean someone is abusing the system.

You’ve mentioned that employers don’t want to dismiss people unnecessarily because of the cost of recruiting and training replacements, and I agree. But that doesn’t change the fact that people can be dismissed for recurrent short-term sickness absence, depending on the circumstances and the company’s sickness policy.

People can be signed off work without seeing a GP in person nowadays. So having a medical certificate doesn’t necessarily mean a GP has personally examined them, just as not having seen a GP and self certifying on numerous occasions doesn’t mean someone isn’t genuinely ill.

Employers can and do manage recurrent absence without automatically accusing someone of dishonesty. Again, in some circumstances, it can and does result in dismissal. That’s also consistent with the ACAS guidance I referred to previously.

When I last checked, they employed adults capable of deciding for themselves if their employment contracts are fair or not.

Are you suggesting people working in nurseries are incapable of understanding the terms of their own employment and deciding for themselves if they’re happy with them?

Quite condescending of you to suggest so is that’s the case

It depends on how long they've had it for. You're generally contagious just before the symptoms show and for 5 to 10 days afterwards.

I'm privileged enough not to have to work for a sociopathic company which demands office attendance even if I really an not in good shape and shouldn't be spreading disease around like a walking germ factory. A couple of people off this week due to bad colds, they are working from home as best they can.

An employer should know their employees well enough to determine if they’re taking the piss or not. In my experience, it’s fairly obvious who is taking the piss…:
Regular Mondays off
Routinely taking days off either side of bank hols
Normally sick after football games or other events they’ve been going to…only to make a miraculous recovery the next day

A good employer and HR professional will know.

No I'm not, as well you know I suspect , I'm pointing out that you are quite happy to rely on the services of people in traditionally low waged occupations while simultaneously saying that they shouldn't be in them if their wages don't allow for putting something aside for illness or if their employers penalise the absences you want people to take to not be 'selfish" as you put it.

That's quite hypocritical and short sighted imo.

People don’t get ‘long colds’

10% of all Covid infections lead to long Covid with 2 million people in this country alone affected - including May young people. Fitness and youth won’t protect you.

Each Covid infection damages the immune system and increases this risk. This doesn’t happen with colds.

I think we all wanted Covid to be like a cold. But in many cases it’s not. Nobody needs to lockdown just don’t spread it about if you know you have it.

What’s hypocritical about it? You’re making endless unnecessary assumptions.

Penny of folk could work in those roles but have inherited wealth, wealthy partner, low living costs (eg no kids), so on and so forth.

It’s not for me or us to decide if what they get paid is enough for them. Thats a matter for them and between only them and their employer.

My point is purely that people should be considerate of others and not need to be propped up by the state (= other tax payers) to help them live their life: they should make appropriate life choices that see them living within their means.

That concept applies to everyone independent of means. Traditionally it’d be called common sense financial planning however nowadays it seems a radical concept to some. I even previously was accused of eugenics (!) purely for suggesting people should live within their means (in that case, by not having kids they can’t afford. Which is exactly what I’ve done: stopped at the number of kids I can afford).

Employees who are genuinely ill and not abusing the system can still be managed under the same sickness absence policy because policies need to be applied consistently and fairly.

Repeated absences don’t automatically mean someone is dishonest, and genuine illness doesn’t always follow a convenient pattern. Regular Mondays off or absences around bank holidays might raise questions, but they don’t prove someone is faking illness.

A good employer and HR professional should investigate the circumstances, consider the available evidence and follow the appropriate process rather than simply deciding they know who is taking the piss.

YANBU I agree with you.
Your friend should absolutely stay away from an exercise class until no longer infectious both for other people's wellbeing and for her own too (not resting during the initial infection can increase risk of long covid)
Your manager should either stay off sick, work from home or wear a mask.
I am so over people who are so inconsiderate and if I caught something from them when they knew they were infectious I would be furious.
Their behaviour is against current health advice and is highly unethical.
This is why I literally wear a mask everywhere. I would like to stop but you just cannot trust people to do the right thing.
I hope you don't catch it.

I wholeheartedly agree.

Coming into work or any other environment around other people when you are sick & contagious is the dirtiest thing a person do.

I have had to check the date. Is it 2020?
Covid is going to be one of those things that is around forever now, and we do have to live with it.

@ExpectMore What are you on about? I have never received a penny in benefits in my entire life - even during my years as a single mum when the only wage coming in was mine.
But can I afford days off ill when I don't get paid? No. Do I have an extortionate prviate rent to pay? Yes.
You can, obviously take as much time unpaid as you like. Great.
You have said you are taking 6 weeks of parental leave to frequently be on MN spend time with your little kids.
Like everyone can afford this! You also earn 3 times the salary of your partner FFS - and you seem to have zero idea how others can't just get a better paid job/take time off for unpaid illness etc.
You don't live in the real world.

Well please tell that to many employers .

Gosh

Yep, even the NHS expects people in.
If you were well enough to work, then you came in. Didn't matter if you were coughing up a lung.
I was not even sent home when I was shivering cold in motorcycle leathers and sitting in front of heater with dizzyness and nausea . I was so ill.

So many times on here, you have people saying that they have never had a day off sick in their whole working life. I bet they were the ones spluttering all over their colleagues.

Is feeling fine but likely contagious ok?

I can’t take as much unpaid time off as I’d like… just what I can afford. If I could, I wouldn’t work at all but unfortunately there’s bills to be paid.

I’ve rented, and am a landlord, and rented whilst also being a landlord and can assure you landlords aren’t coining it in. I make an annual loss on my rental. I’ll sell it as soon as I can.

I live in the real world. The real world expects me to provide for myself as I have no fall back safety net. That’s why I do. That’s what I’ve always done even when just scraping by. That’s why I don’t see why every one can’t. It’s a lifestyle choice to prioritise other things that often catches people out

Do you really expect people to be sympathetic to your 'oh I'm just an accidental landlord, it's so hard when I've got an asset I can't sell'?

You talk about how hard you've worked and that's why you can swan off work for six weeks. Has it occurred to you, that other people might have worked as hard as you, or actually might have worked twice as hard as you, or worked far more hours, and yet not be as financially secure, not to do with their level of effort but to do with luck, like where and when they were born?

You remind me of people I know born in the 70s who go on about how hard they worked compared to the younger staff, completely ignorant to the fact that they got massive advantages of being born in an era that meant they had free education, a great job market at the time they were graduating, genuine social mobility, and much lower costs of living, most notably with house prices when they were in their twenties.