Most employees in Belgium consider themselves healthy, but in reality, the majority of them are struggling with a health problem in some shape or form.
A recent survey by HR services provider Attentia carried out 167,427 occupational health surveys questioning employees about the state of their health. The results showed that nine out of ten (91%) employees of Belgian companies consider themselves healthy.
However, the organisation found that workers are not doing as well as they think. Almost two in three (63%) surveyed employees are overweight and a quarter (23%) of them are obese. Meanwhile, two-thirds of employees have blood pressure that is too high or in the risk zone. This is exacerbated by the fact that four in 10 employees never exercise or exercise less than half an hour.
The results show that the way people view their health is an overestimation of reality, according to Dr Edelhart Kempeneers, a Medical Director at Attentia.
"Obesity, hypertension and lack of exercise are risk factors for health problems such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes and certain cancers. Prolonged stress can also lead to heart disease, anxiety, depression and even a weaker immune system. So we should not take it lightly," he stressed.
Differences in age
Men and employees over the age of 45 are most likely to be overweight and have high blood pressure but men are more active than women, as 39% of men exercise two hours or more weekly, compared to three in 10 women.
Men also do worse when it comes to their bad habits: More men smoke than women while men drink alcohol more regularly and the older they get, the more they drink. Younger employees in turn smoke more often than their older colleagues.
However, when it comes to stress, women are more likely to report experiencing this health issue than men. "In fact, a fifth (19%) of women report increased to greatly increased levels of stress, and stress seems to increase with age."
Remarkably, the youngest generation of workers (15 to 24 years old) includes both the most active and the least active employees. A quarter of young workers exercise more than four hours a week, while more than four in 10 of them never exercise or exercise less than half an hour a week.
Blue-collar workers are also unhealthier than white-collar workers. "Our studies show that blue-collar workers exercise less outside work, eat less healthily, sleep less well, smoke more often and have a less healthy body weight."
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Aside from the fact that an unhealthy lifestyle increases the risk of disease, Attantia noted that it also leads to higher absenteeism within companies, which in the medium and long term reached record highs last year.
Kempeneers stressed that employers should focus on a preventive approach to keep their employees physically and mentally healthy, especially employers of blue-collar workers. "We have to get rid of the idea that health is purely a private matter," Kempeneers noted. "Both physical and mental complaints keep employees at home en masse. In addition, fit and healthy employees are more often motivated and more productive at work."
