Despite the UK’s reputation for having a sick-note culture, two in three Britons go to work while they are ill because they worry what their boss would think if they phoned in sick.
Market-research company TNS polled 1,000 people and found that 67% feared what their bosses or colleagues would think if they took sick leave.
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Three-quarters of those questioned said they could not take sick leave because they were too busy, while just over half believed it would affect their promotion prospects.
“These results show that there is a widespread fear among British employees of being seen as ‘slacking off’ even though we know the British work the longest hours in Europe,” said Gemma Camp, head of stakeholder management at TNS.
