In work making the rest of us sick - Go Home!

[Crabbity Ann]

This is partially a rant and partially a question. I work in a small-ish air-conditioned office with 6 other people. In the last couple of months I've caught 2 colds because some of my colleagues consider themselves too important to take the day off when they're sick.

Colds I can handle but I've just found out that one of them has a serious infection whilst the other has a close family member (who they visit) that has been admitted to hospital with a particularly severe un-named bug. In normal circumstances I wouldn't mind braving it out but as I'm pregnant I'm starting to get really annoyed with people waving their diseases in my face all the time.

Is there anything that can be done from a professional/welfare/whatever stance? Or, as I suspect, am I just supposed to suck it up and hope I don't catch a disease that could be life threatening to my unborn child?

I realise that I could catch all sorts of diseases from anywhere, I'm just particularly concerned about these guys as I work in close quarters with them and often have to share phones etc where germs could easily be spread.

 

[grumpyoldb]

You know what they say about wraf's and sneezes.......................... DT_Xtremez_42:

 

[MrMasher]

It depends on your office manager if the sick people won't go sick. A good manager should send them to the doc or send them home.

I detest people coming to work coughing their lung butter everywhere.

 

[Odie]

Wear your face welly? DT_Xtremez_14:

 

[Crabbity Ann]

Grumpy Old B: I honestly don't! DT_Xtremez_42:
MrMasher: If only the office manager wasn't the worst (repeat) offender. Last time he did take some sick leave but only after he infected me and 2 other people. DT_Xtremez_25:

Odie: Well I have tried asking politely (they're all several ranks above me) if they shouldn't go home and also dropped some subtle hints ....I've taken to sanitising my phone whenever one of them uses it before me. Maybe that's too subtle, I might try your suggestion DT_Xtremez_31:

 

[MrMasher]

Take it above the office manager then. Tell the boss that the manager keeps infecting everyone thereby dropping productivity!

 

[JPJ83]

Coughs, colds and flu-like bugs are everywhere at this time of year. If you have kids, they'll pick anything and everything up at school or nursery and bring it home. Similarly, living and working in close proximity to lots of other people, in the relatively closed environment of your unit, minor viral illnesses are rife and spread easily.

The best defence against spreading these is simply normal good hygiene practice: washing hands regularly, proper environmental cleaning, covering mouth when coughing/sneezing and disposing of tissues properly.

Whilst I can appreciate your concerns re: your unborn child, none of these minor illnesses will pose any significant threat to them. For everyone except the very seriously unwell these types of bugs are little more than an inconvenience.

If the med centre gave everyone on the station a few days off every time they had a runny nose or tickly cough, the whole mob would grind to a halt.

Yes, for sure, there are martyrs who drag themselves into work when they look like they're gasping their last. These people should be sent home / to the med centre by their manager.

For those with a bit of a cold - remember it's most infectious in the early days when the carrier may have very few symptoms - there is no reason they shouldn't be working - provided they can perform their duties without distraction.

At the end of the day, these bugs are everywhere. You can pick up MRSA by touching the door handle in the tea bar, or a nasty cold by someone sneezing in your direction in Asda.

Sorry.

 

[Downsizer]

Surely as you have the pregnancy disease it should be you banned from the workplace?

 

[Shugster]

Going sick isn't an option in the RAF, you have to be at deaths door before a doctor will give you anything other than an asprin and send you back to work.

Unless it's changed ALOT since I left.

 

[Crabbity Ann]

Whilst I can appreciate your concerns re: your unborn child, none of these minor illnesses will pose any significant threat to them. For everyone except the very seriously unwell these types of bugs are little more than an inconvenience.

If the med centre gave everyone on the station a few days off every time they had a runny nose or tickly cough, the whole mob would grind to a halt.

As I already said in my post, It's not the colds that I'm too bothered about though I wasn't best pleased to spend 2 weeks feeling like sh!t knowing it could've been avoided with a little consideration. It's the more serious ailments that I’m being exposed to that are concerning me like shingles and severe D 'n' V.

Personally I think if someone is sick (and the instances I'm referring to at work were a bit more than a runny nose) they should not be working in an environment where they are in close proximity to multiple other people including pregnant women who are slightly more susceptible to illness as their immune system is lower than normal.

I think, where possible, sickies who insist on coming to work should take themselves off to a quieter office where they can do their job without infecting everyone else. The RAF might “grind to a halt” if everyone who is sick actually went sick but how much work is completed to a sub-standard level because half the office feels like crap because they’ve all been made sick?

Going sick isn't an option in the RAF, you have to be at deaths door before a doctor will give you anything other than an asprin and send you back to work.

Unless it's changed ALOT since I left.

It could be that my experience is just a one off but I would say things must've changed a lot since you left. In addition to knowing a couple of people who seem to be on permanent sick with pressumably made up illnesses (if they're really sick that often then they probably should'nt be serving) there was an occassion a couple of years ago when I went to the doctor to find out what was up with me and get treated. With next to no examination he told me he'd "just sign me off with a cold for 2 days". I got the impression that he thought WAF = want a jack couple of days off. In actual fact it turns out I had mumps but I didn't find that out until I went back to the med centre persistantly and even had to show them a pic of what my head used to look like before I got sick i.e. not the gigantic football shape it had swelled to at that point.

PS looks like they've finally taken the hint and both seem to have gone home today so I won't have to resort to dress cat romeo etc DT_Xtremez_30:

 

[penfold93]

Shingles and D&V are not respiratory diseases and therefore cannot be spread by breathng in the same air. Both are contact diseases shigles is especially close contact so unless you are snogging your boss and getting intimate then there is very little chance of you getting it. The vast majority of D&V causing organisms are spread either through contaminated food or the faecal-oral route ie not washing your hand when you have a sh1t and then spreading it on your hands. So as long as you dont have communal biscuits/food and you are cleaning anything they touch then there should be no issues.

The only real exception is Norovirus which can be droplet spread if someone vomits in your vicinity and the aerosol formed could sread the disease.

Your boss has a duty of care and this comes very loosly under the HASAWA 1974. If you are at a large unit raise your concerns with the nurse/madwife at your SMC or possibly speak to EH.

If you office was not initially designed for the number of people it holds then there may be insufficient ventilation, it may be worth checking out.

If you want to PM me with your full details and where you work I can do some covert digging