The number of people who are no longer able to work as a result of burnout or long-term depression has gone up 40% in four years, data published by the National Institute for Health and Disability Insurance (RIZIV) on Monday showed.
Over 111,000 people in Belgium were given disability benefits due to depression or burn-out in 2020, which represents an increase of 39.23% compared to the situation on at the end of December 2016, according to the institute.
The period of "invalidity" or disability starts after someone has been incapacitated from work for one year.
Of this number, 78,330 people with depression (up by 42% since 2016), and 33,402 people were off work for an extended period of time with burn-out ( up by 33.09% in four years).
Additionally, a total of 170,224 people on disability due to mental health disorders (up by 26.02%), as the total number of disability from work for all causes increased by 20% to 471,040.
The increase in disability among employees and job seekers was slightly less high (+38.72%), of which 36.87% of people are on disability because of a mental disorder, and burn-out and depression account for 24.14% of long-term disability cases.
Among self-employed people, the number of people off of work for a long period of time went up by 50.93% in the last four years, of which one-fourth are disabled due to a mental disorder, and just under 18% were out for burn-out and depression.
The Brussels Times
