Spring slowdown underway: absenteeism in the Netherlands is slightly down
Utrecht, 19 April 2023 – In March, the average rate of absenteeism in the Netherlands fell to 5.0% (compared to 5.1% in February 2023). Flu remains the biggest cause of absenteeism, but has continued to fall in recent weeks. Yet the average absenteeism rate is still substantially higher than before the 2019 COVID pandemic. That was revealed from statistics from health and safety services ArboNed and HumanCapitalCare, both part of HumanTotalCare and jointly serving around 1 million employees.
Seasonality
"A drop in absenteeism in March is common for this time of year," explains Redmer van Wijngaarden, occupational physician and director of medical affairs at ArboNed. In the figures for March 2023, the health and safety services observe that flu is still the biggest culprit, accounting for a quarter of absenteeism. In recent weeks, flu-related absenteeism has been falling steadily.
Absenteeism remains higher than before COVID.
The spring slowdown is an annual trend. However, because of COVID, absenteeism rates have been unpredictable in recent years. For example, the absenteeism rate is currently still substantially higher than before the COVID pandemic. In March 2019, absenteeism was 4.5%, whereas it was 5.6% in March last year. A decline in flu and COVID in particular explains the decrease compared to last year. Absenteeism remains the highest in healthcare at 6.9%. In education (5.7%), average absenteeism is also high, the main difference being that this is back to the usual pre-COVID level in 2019.
More absenteeism due to mental illness
In the case of long-term absenteeism (longer than six weeks), ArboNed and HumanCapitalCare observe that more and more people are dropping out due to stress-related illnesses. Compared to the pre-COVID period in 2019, this rate was 13% higher in 2022 (the share of total absenteeism remained stable, see background article Psychisch verzuim: tijd om het tij te keren [Absenteeism due to mental illness: time to turn the tide]). "It is a growing problem that calls for a long-term solution, both at work and in private life," emphasises Van Wijngaarden. "Besides increasing pressure in the workplace, it is often a combination of factors that cause employees to experience too much stress over too long a period of time. If you can't take the time to recharge sufficiently, the battery will eventually run out of power. And then the road to recovery is a long one: an average of 288 days for burnout."
Constructive dialogue in familiar setting
So don't wait too long and start talking as soon as you recognise the first symptoms in yourself or someone else. There are also tools to identify employees' psychosocial workload in order to improve conditions and increase coping capacity accordingly. "It's important to make enough time for things that energise and to plan holidays," advises Van Wijngaarden. The manager also plays an important role in preventing absenteeism. "Don't take a passive attitude, but show interest, try to gauge what someone is up against and how you can help. Constructive dialogue in a familiar setting is an important tool in the fight against absenteeism due to mental illness."