Long Covid has ‘underappreciated’ role in labor gap: study

Prolonged COVID is putting people out of work and may reduce job productivity for others, contributing to labor shortages and to weigh According to a new study, the US economy at large.

Long Covid — also known as long-haul Covid, post covid or post-acute covid syndrome — is a chronic disease Which is caused by the infection of Kovid-19. Its possible symptoms number in the hundreds and for some it can be debilitating and last for years,

Up to 30% of Americans develop COVID long after COVID infection, affecting 23 million Americans US Department of Health and Human Services said in November.

symptoms can put people out of work For quite some time.

About 18% of people with long-term Covid did not return to work for more than a year after being infected with Covid, according to a a recent study By the New York State Insurance Fund, the state’s largest workers’ compensation insurer. Of this portion, more than 3 out of 4 were under the age of 60.

The other 40% returned to work within 60 days of infection but were still receiving medical treatment — presenting challenges such as reduced hours, reduced productivity and other workplace accommodations, NYSIF said.

According to the report, “If reflected broadly, these findings begin to fill gaps in knowledge about the labor market, including an unmet reason for many unfilled jobs and declining labor participation rates since the emergence of the pandemic.” also includes.”

There are about 1.7 open jobs per unemployed worker. The labor force participation rate stood at 62.3% in December, which has shown “little net change” since the beginning of 2022 and has recently remained one percentage point below its pre-pandemic level, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. jobs report,

The NYSIF report examines 89,107 workers’ compensation claims filed from January 2020 through March 2022. The insurer approved 3,139 claims related to COVID-19, of which 977 involved prolonged COVID, as defined by certain criteria.

Researchers haven’t converged around a uniform definition of long COVID. NYSIF said a worker must either be out of work or receive medical treatment for at least 60 days to be counted as a long-term Covid victim. And, because these are workers’ compensation claims, the data only counts people who had Covid exposure at work.

Other studies show that long-term Covid has put hundreds of thousands, and 4 million Americans, because of work,

According to Gopi Shah Goda, a senior fellow at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, the Long Covid has pulled people out of the labor force at roughly the same rate as annual retirements by baby boomers. In other words, this equates to one additional year of population ageing.

Long Covid’s workplace effect comes in the form of labor demand hovers near historic highs,

Job opportunities and attrition rates by workers hit records after widespread economic reopening in early 2021, as COVID vaccines became widely available. Wages rose at their fastest pace in decades and the layoff rate hit a record low, as businesses competed for workers and then tried to retain them.

Long Covid research suggests that the disease played an under-the-radar role in these broader pandemic-era labor trends, which funneled inflationary pressures into the US economy.

millions of people left the labor force In the early days of the epidemic, due to factors such as illness, care, and fear of infection. But workers have not returned as quickly as had been imagined, especially those outside their prime working years, Jerome Powell, chairman of the US Federal Reserve, Told in November.

Powell said that about 3.5 million workers are still missing. He attributed at least “some” of that difference to the longer Covid.

People who cannot return to work because of long-lasting symptoms may be suffering from many negative financial impact such as low income and Loss of employer-provided health insurance, found NYSIF. Its data showed claimants were also less likely to be out of work.

Plus, there are long Covid medical costs for the average person around $9,000 a yearWithout accounting for any insurance-related coverage.