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Reasons for Low Protection of Vulnerable Workers from COVID-19—Results from the Quantitative and Qualitative Study on Working Life in Latvia

Several individual factors like older age and chronic diseases have been linked with more severe symptoms often leading to hospitalization and higher mortality from COVID-19. Part of adults with such factors is still active in the workforce. The objective of the study was to identify measures taken...

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Autores principales: Matisāne, Linda, Paegle, Linda, Eglīte, Maija, Akūlova, Lāsma, Linde, Asnate Anna, Vanadziņš, Ivars, Mietule, Iveta, Lonska, Jeļena, Litavniece, Lienīte, Arbidāne, Iluta, Rozentāle, Sarmīte, Grīntāle, Ieva
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8153152/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34068240
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18105188
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author Matisāne, Linda
Paegle, Linda
Eglīte, Maija
Akūlova, Lāsma
Linde, Asnate Anna
Vanadziņš, Ivars
Mietule, Iveta
Lonska, Jeļena
Litavniece, Lienīte
Arbidāne, Iluta
Rozentāle, Sarmīte
Grīntāle, Ieva
author_facet Matisāne, Linda
Paegle, Linda
Eglīte, Maija
Akūlova, Lāsma
Linde, Asnate Anna
Vanadziņš, Ivars
Mietule, Iveta
Lonska, Jeļena
Litavniece, Lienīte
Arbidāne, Iluta
Rozentāle, Sarmīte
Grīntāle, Ieva
author_sort Matisāne, Linda
collection PubMed
description Several individual factors like older age and chronic diseases have been linked with more severe symptoms often leading to hospitalization and higher mortality from COVID-19. Part of adults with such factors is still active in the workforce. The objective of the study was to identify measures taken by the employer to protect them and to investigate reasons for low protection of vulnerable workers during the 1st wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. Answers from 1000 workers collected via web-survey and results from 10 focus group discussions were analyzed. Only 31.5% of respondents mentioned that their employer had identified existing vulnerable groups and offered specific measures to protect them. Moving vulnerable workers away from the workplace was the most frequent measure (e.g., transfer to the back-office without contact with clients, telework, paid vacations, paid downtime). Most employers do not see elderly workers and workers with chronic diseases as risk groups, thus are not specifically protecting them. Instead, several employers have included workers critical for business continuity in their risk group. Others had not taken measures because of the lack of information due to general data protection regulation. Poor communication and lack of interest of employers to ask their workers if they need special protection is the topic to be addressed at the national level.
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spelling pubmed-81531522021-05-27 Reasons for Low Protection of Vulnerable Workers from COVID-19—Results from the Quantitative and Qualitative Study on Working Life in Latvia Matisāne, Linda Paegle, Linda Eglīte, Maija Akūlova, Lāsma Linde, Asnate Anna Vanadziņš, Ivars Mietule, Iveta Lonska, Jeļena Litavniece, Lienīte Arbidāne, Iluta Rozentāle, Sarmīte Grīntāle, Ieva Int J Environ Res Public Health Article Several individual factors like older age and chronic diseases have been linked with more severe symptoms often leading to hospitalization and higher mortality from COVID-19. Part of adults with such factors is still active in the workforce. The objective of the study was to identify measures taken by the employer to protect them and to investigate reasons for low protection of vulnerable workers during the 1st wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. Answers from 1000 workers collected via web-survey and results from 10 focus group discussions were analyzed. Only 31.5% of respondents mentioned that their employer had identified existing vulnerable groups and offered specific measures to protect them. Moving vulnerable workers away from the workplace was the most frequent measure (e.g., transfer to the back-office without contact with clients, telework, paid vacations, paid downtime). Most employers do not see elderly workers and workers with chronic diseases as risk groups, thus are not specifically protecting them. Instead, several employers have included workers critical for business continuity in their risk group. Others had not taken measures because of the lack of information due to general data protection regulation. Poor communication and lack of interest of employers to ask their workers if they need special protection is the topic to be addressed at the national level. MDPI 2021-05-13 /pmc/articles/PMC8153152/ /pubmed/34068240 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18105188 Text en © 2021 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Matisāne, Linda
Paegle, Linda
Eglīte, Maija
Akūlova, Lāsma
Linde, Asnate Anna
Vanadziņš, Ivars
Mietule, Iveta
Lonska, Jeļena
Litavniece, Lienīte
Arbidāne, Iluta
Rozentāle, Sarmīte
Grīntāle, Ieva
Reasons for Low Protection of Vulnerable Workers from COVID-19—Results from the Quantitative and Qualitative Study on Working Life in Latvia
title Reasons for Low Protection of Vulnerable Workers from COVID-19—Results from the Quantitative and Qualitative Study on Working Life in Latvia
title_full Reasons for Low Protection of Vulnerable Workers from COVID-19—Results from the Quantitative and Qualitative Study on Working Life in Latvia
title_fullStr Reasons for Low Protection of Vulnerable Workers from COVID-19—Results from the Quantitative and Qualitative Study on Working Life in Latvia
title_full_unstemmed Reasons for Low Protection of Vulnerable Workers from COVID-19—Results from the Quantitative and Qualitative Study on Working Life in Latvia
title_short Reasons for Low Protection of Vulnerable Workers from COVID-19—Results from the Quantitative and Qualitative Study on Working Life in Latvia
title_sort reasons for low protection of vulnerable workers from covid-19—results from the quantitative and qualitative study on working life in latvia
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8153152/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34068240
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18105188
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