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Nuria Triguero
Malaga
Monday, 27 January 2025, 17:11
Last year, up to mid-November (which is as far as the statistics provided by Spain's Social Security system go), more than nine million work days were lost in Malaga province due to sick leave. Absenteeism due to temporary incapacity (TI) continues to grow, both in Spain and in Malaga. It is not just the case that there is more sick leave being taken because there are more people currently in gainful employment. There must be other factors at play as the incidence of sick leave is growing faster than the jobs rate.
There is one indicator that clearly demonstrates this rise: the average monthly incidence per 1,000 workers, which measures how many new TI processes are initiated each month for every thousand active workers. In 2024 this indicator stood at 34.04 in Malaga, which, incidentally, is the highest in Andalucía, while the regional average is 27.85. It has risen by more than one point over the last year, but the increase is even more marked when compared to the pre-pandemic period. In 2019 it was at 28.13, meaning an increase of 21%. However, Malaga province is still slightly below the national average of 35.03. Catalonia, Navarre and the Basque Country are, in that order, the Spanish regions with the highest absenteeism due to illness.
This upward trend in absenteeism due to common illness began a decade ago, around the time that Spain was emerging from the aftermath of the 2008 financial crash and subsequent recession. In 2014 the average monthly incidence was below 20 and rose year by year until the pandemic arrived, which caused a series of distortions in the data. In 2020 and 2021 there were far fewer temporary incapacities due to confinement as well as fewer active workers. Then, just after that, in 2022 there was a rebound effect with sick leave at an all-time high as the effects of Covid met up with a very high incidence of other respiratory infections. In 2023 and 2024, without reaching this peak, the incidence of sick leave continued to rise.
The duration of sick leave periods is also increasing: in 2024 the average was 36.7 days, almost five more than in 2019. In this sense, however, Malaga does not stand out by excess but by default: it is the Andalusian province with the shortest average duration of TIs. The regional average is 50 days per case and the national average is 42.88.
Why are workers taking more and more sick leave? This question is of concern to employers above all, then central government and trade unions. It is the mutual insurance companies, which are financed by the employers, that are devoting most effort to studying the problem. For example, Umivale Activa has a line of research open together with the Valencian institute of economic research and publishes regular reports. "The growing intensity of the phenomenon of absenteeism due to TI, which in Spain is at historical highs and among European countries, deserves a rigorous analysis, given the considerable costs it entails for workers, companies and society as a whole," say those responsible.
There are many factors that may be influencing this: from the ageing of the population to the good employment situation (it is a trend that has already been studied that when there are high rates of unemployment, workers tend to take less sick leave for fear of being made redundant and vice versa: in good economic times absenteeism increases), as well as the worsening of healthcare since the pandemic. The employers' organisation also highlights the management of temporary incapacity, which, it argues, is more agile when it is handled by the mutual insurance companies as they boast a lower incidence and shorter duration of sick leave. In fact, these organisations have been calling for a greater role in the management of sick leave for common illnesses for some time now.
Analysing the types of illnesses that are involved in temporary incapacity processes helps to shed light on this phenomenon. Looking at the evolution of the different health problems that lead workers to request sick leave, there is one heading that has skyrocketed in the last five years: mental health disorders. Between 1 January and 17 November 2024, 19,312 work-related sick leave cases were initiated for this reason, 1.8% more than in the whole of the previous year (which had already marked an all-time high) and 65% more than in 2019. Anxiety, depression and other psychological problems already represent the seventh most common cause of sick leave in the Malaga province. Moreover, if long-term sick leave is analysed, it plays a much greater role: 18% of sick leave cases lasting over one year are linked to mental health issues.
The dean of the official college of psychology of eastern Andalucía, Mariela Checa, says that this increase in sick leave for mental health reasons cannot be separated from the mental health epidemic that has been unleashed throughout the western world as a result of the pandemic. She points out that the glaring lack of psychologists in the public health system is at the root of the problem. Andalucía's SAS public health service has only 50 professionals for the entire province of Malaga, which results in one of the lowest ratios in Spain. "People who can't afford to pay for a private consultation go to their GP, who prescribes them pills and put them on sick leave, but that doesn't solve the problem," said Checa.
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