People coming into work sick

[TheGrinchIsComingToTown]

WHY? WHYYYY?!

Just a moan. Turn up this morning and the girl who's been on holiday for the last week is coughing and sneezing all over us all. It's 9 days until Christmas you utter idiot, why risk making us all sick?

(We all get paid sick pay, so she could have stayed off)

@hulahula2 Covid still very much exists.

With most illnesses you are at your most infectious at the point you feel most ill - so generally at the start when you're running a fever.

@LostittoBostik but they are exposed, just going into a supermarket having dc.
What we don't need is small confined spaces with no manners or ventilation

Actually, it is. That's literally how vaccines, and vaccine boosters in particular, work. If you avoid a cold this year, you will probably get it for longer next year because your immune system will have forgotten what the cold virus "looks like".

It does. Luckily, we have vaccines to remind our immune systems of what it "looks like" so we can fight it off quickly.

Speaking of Covid, look what the lockdowns did to the economy, to children's education, to healthcare, to social care, to small and large businesses. Sometimes, when the illness is very mild, spreading it can be the least-worst option.

Germs are a part of life, you can't stay wrapped in cotton wool and never exposed to anything. Communal workplaces, schools, public transport, theatres, pubs etc are all places where you need to accept a certain level of risk.

All companies have some sort of sickness policy whereby whereby you can't be off for months on end without consequence. Ours is quite strict and I can see how stressed out people get about it. Maybe your colleagues previous place of work was like that? Or maybe someone she knows is going through a disciplinary for sickness absence.

If you are so frightened if picking up a cold maybe you should find a job that us 100% WFH, home school your kids and cancel all your social engagements until April.

I really hope you end up with a stinking cold just before Christmas if "germs are just a part of life"

If she's working and doing her job she can't be that sick, maybe it's just a cold.

I used to work somewhere that you couldn't take a day off sick unless you had a leg hanging off. They were also weird about you going for medical appointments.

My current employer is the complete opposite. In fact when I was new there I had a heavy cold and dragged myself in as I'd done previously, coughing and spluttering all day long. Everyone said I should have stayed in bed. One even had a moan about me on her social media lol.

I'm not off sick often fortunately but I know if I need to I can stay off to recover. I can also wfh if needed. I'm currently full of the cold (almost choking on mucus on and off, can barely speak) feel like shit and won't be going to the office today. I know I'd feel worse there.

Have we not learnt from the pandemic that "just a cold" to one person can be deadly to someone else?

I now mostly WFH so not an issue, but if I took a day off every time I was sneezing or coughing I'd be past the sickness absence thresholds for the year by February. Some of us get colds easily and it's frankly not practical for us to be off every time.

Op you need to grow up.

OP kindly prior to covid more people used to die from flu annually, we just didn't have the death counter, like covid times.

I think a work colleague with a cold vs someone with flu (who wouldn't be to work or move) are two separate issues.

It's annoying when people do spread germs and this is coming from someone currently undergoing therapy for health anxiety, I feel like you 100% but I've had to learn to rational think about the risk.

Equally you can remove yourself from risk of catching her germs, move away, wash hands, use first defence spray, or WFH and take your own sick day for stress.

I don't have health anxiety. I just don't want people to be in coughing all over me a week before Christmas.

If I stayed home everytime I had a cold I'd never get to work. I pick up a lot of colds and they tend to pass quickly but I don't stay home unless I'm actually unwell such as weak or fevery or in pain. Sneezing and runny nose or cough without other symptoms is OK I think as long as you cover yourself and practice good hygiene.

The world would stop turning if everyone with a cold stayed home. I work with kids, if my colleagues and I didn't show the service would cancel and all the parents would have to take absence from their jobs. What if the bus drivers and delivery drivers and teachers called in sick more, the place would be in chaos.

It doesn't bother me a bit if people come into work with colds.

It’s just ridiculous to expect people to stay home every time they have even the smallest sniffle. I do agree that when someone is clearly full of cold or have a fever etc they should IDEALLY stay at home but I do understand why people can’t sometimes.

I don’t get paid sick pay. I’m self employed. Don’t work don’t get paid. I absolutely cannot be off for weeks on end for every cough or sore throat. It sucks yes. I’d honestly much rather be at home on the sofa. Trust me I don’t enjoy my job that much that I’m dragging myself in for the fun of it. I also work in a clinic seeing patients. Yes I’m sure they’d rather not be seen by me with a cold. But equally, they would also be REALLY pissed off if they were cancelled as there wouldn’t be another appointment for about 5 months. If I’m visibly very sick then tough they need to be cancelled. But last year I had a cough that lingered for 8 weeks. I couldn’t take 8 weeks off work! I’d lose my house!
I also work in a small surgery. Only 8 of us. At one point last month there was 5 people with colds. We’d need to close down if they all called in sick! Cancelling around 300 patients for the week. Some whom would have been in pain and needing the appointment.

Also no one can come up with a reasonable idea of how sick leave would work if you are off for any minor illness. So let’s take my work. One of the senior clinicians is likely earning between 500-800 a day. Let’s say she’s sick for a week. If she was to get paid full pay for sick leave from day 1 let’s take an average of £3000 a week. She has a lingering cough like I had. 8 weeks off is £24000. Then oh dear. Her child now has the same thing. So that’s another 8 weeks off to look after them as they can’t go to school. She can’t work from home. So now she’s been paid £48000 over 4 months for doing absolutely no work at all. Don’t be ridiculous. This will never and can never happen. And don’t say well sick pay will just be less than she normally earns, she might not be able to afford that. So you’re back to her needing to go in when sick as her bills may be proportional to what she earns!

Or are people that think everyone should stay off for their entire illness only talking about low paid office workers or those that can WFH as usual?

I'm genuinely astounded that anyone thinks they have a right to expect people not to be out when they've got a snotty nose and a cough. Nothing would work! Completely batshit. Not least because one thing we ought to have learned from covid is that people absolutely do spread germs around when they're not symptomatic.

Also, the answer to your question as to why people do it even when they get sick pay is that there's still a potential comeback to being off sick. All very well you saying people don't get into trouble for just one day, but it's not like she won't be snotty tomorrow. You'd feel just as entitled not to be around her. And none of us know how many illnesses we might get over the next few months.

I had full-on, fever dizzy and in bed flu on New Year's Eve 1999.

Germs are a fact of life.

Common colds aren't the same virus as covid and don't have the same risks.

I'm in work sick. If they want me to stay home, they need paid sick leave and to not deduct sick days from my bonus.

It's unreasonable to expect someone to use holiday leave to cover a cold.

@Honeycrisp I agree, it's absolutely crazy to expect people to stay home with a cold, I get about 10 colds every winter through the kids and I'm not going to stay off work, cancel my social plans or not travel each time I have one. This country is already on its knees in terms of productivity, the last thing we need is more people staying off sick for minor illnesses. It's unfortunate if you get sick over Christmas obviously (I've had covid the last two Christmases before anyone starts shouting that they hope I get sick this year!) but that really is just life in a cold weather climate unfortunately, if it's that important to you not to be sick over Christmas then use your own annual leave to take the week before off rather than expecting others to forgo pay, get sickness warnings etc when they feel well enough to work but have a cough/cold.

Not all workplaces would allow it either, even assuming the person has unused leave available.