Where do you stand on going to work with a cold?

[LittleDisaster]

I was brought up to go to school or work unless you were really physically unable to. I did the same with my DC. I'm sure until recently that was the normal expectation. It was certain yrhe case in the industry I worked in for the first 25 years of my working life.

DS has a low level management role in a service industry and is very frustrated by the ease with which colleagues are prepared to take a day off.

Has there been a real step change or is it my/his upbringing that was weird?

For the first week I have to self certify. After that I get SSP after providing a doctor’s note. SSP is not my full wage. I simply cannot afford it. I earn a very small amount (NMW) and losing even one day’s wages can be too much.

That's not right, you should get it from the 4th day. It's still wholly inadequate but you shouldn't have a full week without pay.

But to me 3.5 days is a week - I study and work part time. So it would be a full week’s wages to me that I would miss out on. And then even after that (which never actually happens because unless you’re seriously unwell you won’t be off for two whole weeks, will you) the SSP does not equal a ‘proper’ wage, so I still could afford it!

Still couldn’t afford it, I meant. I could no more live on SSP than on nothing at all basically.

Meh. It is not comparing like for like. "Work" isn't the same for everyone.
I'm a teacher and hate having to pull the full 110%, all singing and dancing, out of the bag when I'm ill. It's shit.

But I imagine it might be OK if I had an office job, or something less physical and interactive. I think I'd be fine to sit by a computer with a Lemsip beavering away at some spreadsheet and writing emails for a few days.

@Kanaloa I agree with you. I work 3 days per week. Ssp wouldn’t be paid to me either, unless on long term sick. Even so it’s less than 50% of my weekly wage after deductions. For my Dh it is an even smaller percentage of his wage. Not enough to even begin to pay household bills. So out to work it is!

Same here sadly. Rubbish if you really look at it but what can you do?

@Kanaloa I guess we slap on a smile and carry on.
(yep it’s shit, but I’ve no idea what else to do either).

I get ill quite a lot. A mixture of having a young DC and just having a rotten immune system. I get what you're saying, but there's many of us who simply don't have the option of calling in sick for a variety of reasons. For example, childcare, SSP, which isn't adequate enough to pay the bills. The option of working from home etc

Just realised I've quoted the wrong person. Ignore that @Remaker But my point still stands

Do people think tonsillitis is a mild illness? A couple of comments in this thread have surprised me and I realise colleagues may have thought I was swinging the lead.

I had it often as a child and a few times in adulthood and it was always at least ten days with fever, exhaustion, sore everything, lost voice, thumping head. Definitely unfit to leave bed.

I also think people should keep their germs at home and look after themselves.

What this thread shows is that the UK's obsession with presenteeism and bleeding people dry is unhealthy.

More people should be shouting about the need for a better living wage and better sick pay so that people who are genuinely unwell aren't forced to choose between getting better and paying their bills.

There's a rush to the bottom on worker terms and conditions, which is horrible.

I'd work from home with a cold. I'd also ask to work from home if a colleague near me came into the office with one as I'm currently pregnant which makes me more vulnerable to covid, most of all in the third trimester.

In my workplace we encourage people to work from home if they are sick unless they have something essentially face to face in the diary. If it’s just a meeting then we have the facilities to have hem join from home.

A spokesperson for NHS Scotland has just been on BBC Breakfast and stated to stay at home with a cold to stop the spread and protect the NHS. Whilst I think this is over the top I also think people have got short memories and am shocked at the amount of people coughing and spluttering everywhere when this would have been totally socially unacceptable 18 months ago.

I remember being in Austria on holiday once and my brother wasn't well; we went into a pharmacy to try to get him something to help him power through; the pharmacist was horrified and tried incredibly hard to persuade us that what he needed was hardcore levels of vitamins and lots of rest so that his immune system could do its job properly.

I don't know how widespread that is but from family there they say it's just a very different approach to illness, with much less emphasis on being tough and soldiering on.

A middle way would be to require masks again in public and in the workplace.

I think lots of people forget this actually.
It's true of children too. Some will have a mild sniffle, spread it to others who end up in hospital or at home on nebulisers and sreroids. It's incredibly common for young children to be badly affected by colds, especially if they have a tendency to asthma too, as their airways are so narrow. When my parents were young, many infants and small children died of colds - they each lost a sibling in the 1940s. Fortunately modern medicine prevents most deaths now, but lots of small children are still hospitalised with colds every year. Mine were, and I found many of the other parents didn't even realise it was a possibility. Lucky them (and lucky me for living when and where I do).

Colleague used to moan at me if I turned up at work with a hacking cough. Insisted she was highly vulnerable. She never once caught a cold off me as far as I could tell.

"protect the NHS" - that phrase does my head in. It suggests that we are here to serve the NHS, not the other way round!