I'm OK, Are YOU?
The report, which drew from National Comorbidity Survey and the National Mortality Followback Survey data, found companies pay more than $17 billion a year in “unproductive” wages to workers with mental disorders.
Production Impact
However, according to the report in HealthScoutNews, less than a third of that total goes to pay workers who miss workdays because of their substance abuse. The bulk, some $12 billion, is lost because productivity declines due to the illness.
“The rates are extremely high,” says Robin Hertz, study author and a senior director of population studies at Pfizer Pharmaceuticals Group. “As a nation, we have to be more attentive to these types of problems. There is a mythology out there that if you are at work you are healthy. That is not really true.”
The most common mental disorders among workers aged 18 to 54 are:
- alcohol abuse or dependence – 9%
- major depression – 8%
- social phobia – 7%
Self Assessment
And the costs aren’t just borne by others. The study found that men and women with mental disorders earn on average 22% less than people without mental disorders.
Not that the sources of the problem are always evident. Roughly two-thirds of the 28 million workers who have a mental disorder have never had that condition officially diagnosed – and just 14% of workers with mental disorders have been treated in the prior year, according to the report.
For a list of the symptoms of common mental illnesses,
visit the National Institute of Mental Health at
http://www.nimh.nih.gov/publicat/index.cfm