Record Numbers Not Working Due To Ill Health

Dorset

A bad back can be monitored by MRI and many test. Hopefully everybody who is saying they have a bad back has these test as proof, surely?

I dont doubt the individual examples that people have brought up of "skivers". In any system there will be a few who seek to use it.

what distresses me is that these examples are then taken to mean fraud on a massive scale, when so many are in terrible distress and there is no "life of riley".

A few examples proves nothing - except human nature is at work.

A bad back can be monitored by MRI and many test. Hopefully everybody who is saying they have a bad back has these test as proof, surely?

There are tens of thousands of frontline workers like doctors, nurses, teachers, pilots, much too ill to work after repeated infection with covid. The virus attacks vital organs, the heart, kidneys, brain, lungs and causes damage. It is a vascular disease and any virus that can kill 222,000 in UK in three years must tell us it also leaves very sick patients who won't ever be able to work again. We still see the equivalent of two jumbo jets a week killed with covid, including babies & small children. There are sudden deaths of young people weeks/months after a covid infection, after it has damaged their hearts. This is the reality of 2023, it is frightening. Thousands still have to shield completely as a third of infected people do not show symptoms, they can kill if they spread it to vulnerable elderly or babies.

Unless the govt takes it seriously and brings back mitigations we are going to lose many more professionals to Long Covid. This is obviously the elephant in the room currently tanking our economy. Too many top people too ill to work. We can't turn back the clock to 2019, the virus is more infectious now than in 2020 and everyone can't have a vaccination this year.

It is grim, until we learn to live with mitigations.
We all know someone close to us who died of covid, or because of it.

Some of the comments here make me very sad. If you have your health be grateful and don’t judge those who are too ill, whether mentally or physically, to hold down a job.
Living on benefits does not give you the ability to “ live the life of Riley”.

Germanshepherdsmum

Even at the highest rate of tax, working pays.

Exactly!

People might consider that the extra isn't worth it for work/life balance, but it will pay - at the high levels (not always when people are on minimum wage and need childcare).

I took time off work when I had a heart attack and a cancer op followed by radiotherapy. Shame on me!

Even at the highest rate of tax, working pays.

biglouis

It is not only sick people not economically active.

Ive just seen an interesting thread on mumsnet where some very high earners were pointing out that (taken with the cost of childcare) they were at 100k+ working for nothing after tax. So the answer in some cases was (apart from putting more into a pension) to drop down to 3 or 4 days a week to being their salary under 100K. Or even to take career breaks. This is a similar scenario which deters some economically over 50s from returning to work. They will get hammered on PAYE and have decided that living more frugally and having the free time is preferable to working for the tax man. Yay!

In effect there are numbers of talented people working less hours by choice because the tax burden makes it untenable. This is a loss to the British economy and is not going to be addressed without radical reform of the entire corrupt tax system.

How do they work that out?

They might be taxed at a high rate on the excess, but they won't be working for nothing.

When you’re working to deadlines on big deals you don’t budget for being ill wwm. I have always been keenly aware of my responsibilities and done my utmost to honour them.

I have never had what you might call good health - I’ve had asthma since babyhood and epilepsy since my teens, osteoarthritis since 21. Add the depression and anxiety (and I’m not exaggerating the day the wheels totally came off, when thankfully I was at home and my doctor saw me immediately). I have depended on medication since I was a baby so I remember nothing else. I’m grateful for the advances that have been made, but my entire life has been a matter of carrying on. But others have worse problems. I don’t belittle or judge those who are genuinely too ill to work.

Casdon

You are talking about illnesses which are short term, that’s not the group of people covered by the original post, it’s a different set of statistics. If you have cancer, a serious accident or illness and are hospitalised you can’t work. Mental health is a separate category, suffering from depression or anxiety makes work very difficult for some people - but if you have an active psychosis you can’t work. It’s not a competition.

Oh sorry I got a bit side-tracked

Another comment - very left wing I'm sure but there is an obscene amount of money sloshing around in the accounts of the top few percent of society. There should be some way, in our country, to ensure that everyone has enough to eat, to stay warm and dry, to be educated and have their health cared for, and so what if a few get away with more than they are supposed to? It's better than many going hungry. We are supposed to be a 'Christian' country but so many people do not seem to have read the Sermon on the Mount.

halfpint1 it is an option if you’re severely ill or have broken limbs as a friend of mine had, she broke both of her arms, couldn’t work.
I have a number of self employed friends, it’s tough, fortunately most have provision, either insurance or savings to cover an amount of absence.

You are talking about illnesses which are short term, that’s not the group of people covered by the original post, it’s a different set of statistics. If you have cancer, a serious accident or illness and are hospitalised you can’t work. Mental health is a separate category, suffering from depression or anxiety makes work very difficult for some people - but if you have an active psychosis you can’t work. It’s not a competition.

Lot of assumptions and prejudice on here, it strikes me. Playing the system? Is there one to 'play' any more, and has anyone tried living on benefit? Long Covid is very real and those with it receive little help because the condition is poorly understood. Our health has gone 'weird' because of the pandemic, Covid and - in my view - the much promoted vaccination. Me? I'm 72, work pretty much full time and enjoy great health and energy, thank the Goddess. I have a friend with long covid (not on benefit, I must stress) and her life has just dwindled. I must say that those of us who are fortunate enough to be able to work and enjoy a good lifestyle should hesitate to judge those less fortunate until we have 'walked a mile in their moccasins.'

Germanshepherdsmum

Covid - after I retired.
Real flu once in my 20s, flu jab every year.
Gastroenteritis - one day at home with phone.
Mental breakdown - yes, medication for depression and anxiety still taken to this day, no time off. How I carried on I don’t know but I had no choice.

Perhaps now you understand that if you’re self employed you still work because you have to. You know what I did for a living - keeping my valuable client base was crucial.

Don’t you budget for times like that?

My point being that there is absolutely no way that anyone can work with a bad dose of the stuff that I had listed. Any total mental breakdown, would definitely mean not working. I for example didn’t know who I was or had any memory for a couple of weeks.

The fact that you appeared to have good health throughout your working life.

So please don’t belittle those who are too ill to work - or judge them.

I cannot believe the. Umber of people on here who believe that back pain cannot be proved or disproved! Of course it can! There are CAT scans, X-Rays and MRI scans to name but 3 investigations that can pinpoint problems. So many of you blaming people who are in pain for being in pain. How awful.

Covid - after I retired.
Real flu once in my 20s, flu jab every year.
Gastroenteritis - one day at home with phone.
Mental breakdown - yes, medication for depression and anxiety still taken to this day, no time off. How I carried on I don’t know but I had no choice.

Perhaps now you understand that if you’re self employed you still work because you have to. You know what I did for a living - keeping my valuable client base was crucial.

I will be 70 in a few days but haven’t been able to work since I was 58 due to a very painful spine due to what I believe was the dangerous patient moving and handling practices in my job as a nurse . All my major joints give me agony and I take strong medication every day . I’d love to be able to go for a country walk but that will never happen now. I have a lovely family who will do anything for me so I should count my blessings .

halfpint1

I am self employed and have been for many years, being too sick to work is never an option.

I think that is a tad exaggerated.

I can think of lots

Covid
Real flu
Gastric enteritis
Mental breakdown
Lots more

So - your comment is exaggerated. What I suspect you meant was that you may work when others may go sick.

It is not only sick people not economically active.

Ive just seen an interesting thread on mumsnet where some very high earners were pointing out that (taken with the cost of childcare) they were at 100k+ working for nothing after tax. So the answer in some cases was (apart from putting more into a pension) to drop down to 3 or 4 days a week to being their salary under 100K. Or even to take career breaks. This is a similar scenario which deters some economically over 50s from returning to work. They will get hammered on PAYE and have decided that living more frugally and having the free time is preferable to working for the tax man. Yay!

In effect there are numbers of talented people working less hours by choice because the tax burden makes it untenable. This is a loss to the British economy and is not going to be addressed without radical reform of the entire corrupt tax system.

halfpint1

I am self employed and have been for many years, being too sick to work is never an option.

Indeed. Never been an option for us.

Agreed halfpint. I was self employed for many years too - medication and grinning and bearing it was the only way. I have never been tougher on anyone than I am on myself.

Rainnsnow

It is low , but makes a great headline to news for people who don’t have a clue about the real world

The Blair government, and the Coalition led by David Cameron deliberately launched a campaign to give the public the impression that fraud was rife in disability/sickness benefits. In Blair’s case it was because they were trying to justify a major overhaul of the system which would have left claimants worse off - they replaced sickness benefit with ESA, which was much harder to claim, and wanted to reform DLA. The coalition wanted to cut welfare drastically and what better way to do it than enlist the press and the media to photograph claimants on the golf course and in various other situations and then give the impression that this was ‘the norm’. They succeeded because they got the public support they needed. Same thing is happening now - this government wants reform but so far they’ve resisted claimant blaming. Personally, and from some of the comments I’ve read here, I don’t think they need to. Clearly there was enough damage done first time round to leave a lasting impression that a lot of sick and disabled people are scroungers. It’s clear that the system needs to be overhauled because it’s not fit for purpose. But not at the expense of genuinely sick and disabled people who cannot work and need support. Unfortunately they are likely to be the very people who will suffer, because they’re an easy target.

I am self employed and have been for many years, being too sick to work is never an option.

biglouis

Ive done the PIP forms for 2 relatives. I am good at filling in forms. One got the top rate and one the lower rate. The latter has just been upgraded on the form I helped him with a few months ago. There are "techniques" to filling in these forms so as to gain the maximum number of points. People who have illnesses and disabilities are not always best able to express how it affects them in the kinds of "technical" language expected by the form.

It’s not really true to say there is a ‘technique’ or technical language particular to the completion of PIP forms. It’s down to the realisation that just having the condition itself is not enough. PIP assessors are not interested in the condition itself, it’s how it affects the daily life of the claimant, and successful claims tend to be the ones where the claimant has given a full account of how their condition affects each activity assessed, and has provided medical or other evidence to support the claim.

I’ve volunteered at my disability charity, completing PIP applications/MR’s and tribunal applications on behalf of the membership since PIP was introduced in 2013, and I’m still astounded at the number of people who fill in the forms with the bare minimum of detail and expect that the assessor will know what the condition is and how it affects them. Same with the face to face - there’s an expectation that the assessor knows the effects of the condition and a failure to understand that no two people with the same condition will be affected in the same way so you have to account for yourself as an individual.

One of the biggest problems I’ve come across is that people are, understandably, sometimes too proud to divulge what they see as the embarrassing detail, especially when it comes to the help they need with washing, dressing and toileting. So they don’t tell it like it is, and they are turned down. It’s also important to say how you are affected on your worst days, how much help you need from someone else, whether you have aids or appliances to do certain things and to check you haven’t contradicted yourself anywhere on the form, because it will be picked up and challenged. An understanding of how mobility is assessed is also important because it’s not just a matter of how far you can walk in one go, but over the whole day, and whether you can do it repeatedly and reliably, safely and in good time. I always advise people to provide as much evidence. - medical and written statements from carers, care plans etc - as they can because without it, you are solely reliant on the assessors opinion, on which the DWP will base their award.