To be so fed up with people spreading illness?

[pookie29]

All last week there was a woman floating around work saying “ooh I feel awful today but I still came in” she was hacking her guts up everywhere and generally did sound unwell.

I’m now on a two week holiday and today my throat is sore and I’m very achy. This sort of thing seems to happen to me all the time! My one time to relax and I feel like crap because someone else is so inconsiderate.

AIBU to think that if you’re ill then you should stay off work? If you really really have to be in then you should try to avoid people where possible and wear a mask etc.

Public sector? It’s full of people like this who think the place would crumble without them.

I see all angles of this.

No one wants to work when unwell
People can't afford to take time off
If you are off with every sniffle you'd never be in
You are also contagious before your symptoms show so it's too late by the time you are unwell - you've already shared!
I think a cold or similar carry on, anything worse D&V for example - stay at home.

Coughs and colds are perfectly normal. Other than washing hands regularly and covering mouth/nose to cough and sneeze we need to go about our business. If I took a day off work for a cold my boss would laugh her socks off then given me a stern word - as it should be.

As someone else said, I didn’t feel unwell at the time of the flight. If I had then I would have taken the precautions I mentioned (eg wearing a mask and sanitising hands etc)

In fairness I seem to only catch from this particular lady who has a desk opposite mine. she seems to be unable to cough covering her mouth or sanitise anything. Lots of people who come in under the weather will keep their distance, but as I’m forced to be next to this lady I always seem to get her illnesses too

Can you look into moving desks?

Your manager may be able to help you discreetly, if you don’t want to offend this woman.

But not cancelled eh? Sounds a bit double standards to me does that.

Double edge sword isn’t it? I totally agree lots of people are beyond selfish at spreading their germs, but there are many occasions where you need to push on. If you are full of cold you don’t need to go out socially and can avoid supermarkets etc for a few days but if there’s no one to cover you at work or you have children to get to school etc you have to mix to a certain extent. That being said there are things people can do in those situations to limit spreading it further. I was infuriated by standing in a queue at the shop with husband and wife in front, him streaming with cold, her clearly ok! Why couldn’t he wait outside instead of coughing his germs all over the shop? That kind of thing is unreasonable

I’ve worked when I had a cold, and when I looked at what I’d done the next day, it was equivalent to my work when I’m drunk - mistakes all over the place! I work for DH and his partner. Neither of them want to do their work with a cold either; and his partner is a single parent - I doubt he wanted to go home, after a day’s work, requiring concentration to look after his two DC on his own either.

Next time that happens say very clearly and bluntly to the woman that the rest of the office don’t appreciate her coming in and spreading germs everywhere and if she stayed at home and got over her bug then the entire office wouldn’t be going down with it too and spreading it to their friends and family etc! People like this need to be told they are being selfish and NOT deserving a medal for coming in and spreading their germs around!!

Ask to move desks too as you’re sick of her coughing all over you with her mouth open and catching all her bugs

You would cancel a holiday over a cold/sore throat?

Well I wouldn’t but then again I would be at work with a cold and a sore throat whereas the OP thinks this is ridiculous that her colleague would do this.

Quite, me too.

Rewind a few years and it was unthinkable to take a day off unless you were covered in blood, projectile vomiting or unconscious. We just got on with it. I once had to lead a conference with the closest to flu I have ever had. Only knew it wasn’t actual flu as I had had the vaccine and could just about drag myself there.

When she can easily wfh, surely this is more considerate? And, as I have said many times, if she had to come in (which she didn’t) she should’ve been covering her mouth and cleaning her hands. Do you really think this is an unreasonable thing to expect?

This kind of thing drives me flipping nuts. I’d tell her when I went back. Totally selfish. I had a boss in a coffee shop who proudly said from the bar that he’d never taken a sick day, while coughing, spluttering and sneezing into 800 people’s coffees as he made them…

In your original
post you asked if you were being unreasonable to say that if you are ill you should stay off work.

My reply is that a sore throat or cold isn’t ill for the purposes of missing work.

It’s you who drip fed about home working.

For me if I was ill and I was able to wfh then I would. If I had a cold and was unable to wfh, as millions of other people cannot, then I’d have to go to work.

If you want the replies you want then you should post without drip feeding I suppose.

Enjoy your holiday - I hope you don’t stay in the villa, there really is no need. It’s a
cold.

People are so selfish and there is no excuse to come to work vomiting - none at all.

YABU. Getting ill is part of the human experience.

Yeah there is, hangover (my 20s) pregnancy (my 30s) 😆😆

How close did you get to her, presumably you kept your distance while she was coughing? How are you certain you caught whatever you have from her, could’ve been from someone else

More likely that she caught it from the plane then!

I agree OP. People who go into work ill really irritate me! Its stupid and selfish, the illness just goes around the workplace like wildfire! Im cabin crew and don’t get me started on people who fly when obviously ill or full of a cold/flu…even more selfish in s confined space with recycled air!

I sat in the waiting room of a doctors the other month. Only to find out the child opposite me had chicken pox. Furious wasn’t the word, I then had to fuck about ringing the hospital and speaking to haematology and finding out what I needed to do and how to get anti virals etc
I try and always avoid the waiting room but it was pouring down outside

The child was probably waiting to see the GP as well, no?