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An article
in the Sunday Times has reported that stress related problems
can reduce business by up to 10%. Current estimates suggest that
UK employees lose £20 billion from missed deadlines, sick pay
and poor performance.
The international
labour organisation estimates that the cost of stress amounts
to over 10% of Britain's gross national product.
The government
health and safety executive (HSE) has reported that about 5 million
workers describe their job as very stressful and around half a
million say they experience work related stress at levels that
they believe make them ill.
Three stress
related disorders - chronic pain including back, neck and shoulder
pain, hypertension and headache are estimated to account for a
high percentage of annual absences. Recent research claims that
common back problems, repetitive strain injury (RSI) and other
musculoskeletal disorders are now the primary causes of absenteeism
(European Agency for Safety and Health at work) with 1-2 million
working days lost every year. This condition affects 200,000 people
per year and is estimated to cost industry £400 million per annum.
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