Workers calling in sick in record numbers amid Omicron wave

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More employees missed work due to illness or disability last month than at the outset of the pandemic as the Omicron wave spread rapidly and forced semi-lockdowns in parts of the country.

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Statistics Canada reported that 10 per cent of workers were absent from their job for all or part of the week in which it conducted its January labour force survey. That’s about a third higher than the average for January between 2017 and 2019 and higher than the 8.1 per cent seen in March 2020, the agency reported Friday.

“Absences from work due to illness or disability — that is, for any short or long term health-related reason — tend to follow a seasonal pattern, and typically peak in the winter,” Statistics Canada said in its report. “However, as the Omicron variant of COVID-19 spread across the country, absences due to illness or disability reached record highs in January.”

Benjamin Reitzes, a strategist and managing director at Bank of Montreal, said the high level of absenteeism should pass as the Omicron wave subsides and the staggering loss of jobs should recover. Canada’s economy shed 200,000 positions in January as provinces forced high-contact businesses to close in efforts to combat the virus that strains hospital systems.

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Now that provinces such as Quebec and Ontario have began lifting restrictions, job levels should bounce back. “There’s no reason to believe this wave will be any different than past waves,” Reitzes said in an interview.

The short-term hit was expected and the Bank of Canada likely feels vindicated for holding its interest rate last week, he said. But with inflation climbing, the central bank will probably still hike in March.

Almost all industries had higher than average absences during January, with the exception of education, public administration and utilities. Statistics Canada conducted its survey from Jan. 9 to 15, when many schools had shifted to online learning.

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Almost a quarter of respondents also said they have been working at home exclusively during the pandemic, higher than the 7.5 per cent recorded in census data.

Just 10 per cent of Canadians wanted to leave their jobs last month, which is lower than the 20 per cent cited in the Bank of Canada’s business and consumer outlook surveys.

“It’s curious,” Jimmy Jean, chief economist at Desjardins, said in an interview. He noted that wage growth has tended to be tepid in Canada, but with high vacancies numbering close to 900,000, that should push wages higher and prompt more job switching, he said.

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