More people away from work due to sickness

The number of employed people in the March 2022 quarter who gave sickness, illness, or injury as the main reason they were away from all forms of work for a full week was up 67 percent compared with the same quarter last year, Stats NZ said today.

Of the 2.8 million employed people in the March 2022 quarter, 44,200 were away from work for a full week because of sickness, illness, or injury (1.6 percent of employed people), an increase of 17,700 people compared with the March 2021 quarter.

"Sickness, illness, or injury as the main reason for being away from work for a full week has tended to remain fairly consistent, and in the March 2022 quarter we've seen it increase by around two thirds annually as Omicron cases began to increase in the community," work and wellbeing statistics senior manager Becky Collett said.

The number of people who said they were sick, ill, or injured as the primary reason that they were working fewer hours in the week than usual in their main job also increased, up 11,400 people (21 percent) compared with the March 2021 quarter.

People in the Household Labour Force Survey who mentioned that being sick with COVID-19 impacted their labour market activities are included in the sickness, illness, or injury group, with the March 2022 quarter showing strong growth in that group.

"Despite 108,900 people being sick and working fewer or no hours, the effect of this was rather muted on seasonally adjusted hours actually worked, which only dipped 0.2 percent over the quarter," Ms Collett said.

Previously, annual changes were more evident in 'COVID-19 related reasons' group, which serves as an umbrella-term to capture broad effects of the pandemic that do not fit into our pre-existing response options.

COVID-19 slows labour market activities describes all measures where 'COVID-19 related reasons' were introduced in the June 2020 quarter.

"People across the motu [country] may still be affected by COVID-19 without being sick themselves, so we continue to separate those responses out," Ms Collett said.

"For instance, vaccine mandates, concern for safety, or being a household contact or caregiver of someone who was sick could still impact people's labour market activity without them being sick themselves."

In the March 2022 quarter, 17,500 people specified a COVID-19 related reason for why they were away for a full week of work.

COVID-19 related reasons peaked as the reason why employed people were away from work for a full week during the June 2020 and September 2021 quarters, when restrictions regarding lockdown levels and traffic light settings were most strict.