August 22, 2016
Two thirds of employers don’t understand impact of workplace health issues 0
A new study from Aon Employee Benefits claims that UK employers are less likely than other employers in the EMEA region to have a defined workplace health strategy with just 37 percent understanding the impact of their employees’ health issues. The 2016 EMEA Health Survey suggests that UK employers are less likely than others in the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region to have a defined health strategy (30 percent vs 40 percent). The survey also claims that UK employers’ actions are out of line with their actual concerns. 63 percent believe their top issue is managing stress and mental health issues, while 51 percent suggest that physical health is their second highest health and wellbeing priority. However, more employers have physical and social programmes to support employee wellbeing (57 percent and 55 percent respectively), while just 41 percent have an emotional or psychological programme in place.
August 19, 2016
The staggeringly cynical medicalisation of the air that we breathe 0
by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Wellbeing
As regular readers are no doubt aware, normally we don’t comment on the reports and surveys we publish, instead leaving people to form their own opinions. However, the study we’ve published today from the Building Engineering Services Association can’t pass without comment. You are still free to make your own mind up, but personally, I think it is perhaps the most dangerously self-serving report we’ve seen in some time. The conclusion from the report that ‘healthy indoor air’ (I’ve added the quotation marks), provided by mechanical ventilation and air-conditioning systems is somehow superior to fresh air (I’ve removed the quotation marks from the original report), is staggeringly cynical. We’ve all grown used to the medicalisation of day to day life in these reports, but this is too much. The fact is, the healthiest thing you’ll do today is to get up from your desk, get away from the air con, get away from the traffic, stick two fingers up to BESA, go for a long walk in the fresh air and breathe deep.