Populations are ageing and increasingly living longer with chronic conditions. This trend undoubtedly has an effect in the workplace and increases the cost to companies as employee absence levels increase. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has proven that many of the costly and disabling diseases can be prevented yet individuals, organisations and healthcare systems do not make the best use of their available resources to support this process. HR departments are ideally placed to inform employees about workplace health promotion and disease prevention strategies to improve their employees overall productivity and lower the cost of having an unhealthy workforce.
In this first section we feature two articles that deal with wellness promotion in the workplace and pandemic preparedness. In the first article Audrey Tsui argues that HR departments should not limit their wellness plans by only focusing on smoking cessation and alcohol abuse. Tsui argues that wellness involves emotional, physical and intellectual components in what she terms ‘total wellness’. The risks of ignoring total wellness are all too common according to Tsui. She cites the Japanese phenomenon of Karoshi or sudden death from exhaustion as an example. Wellness shouldn’t be seen as a cost but an investment.
In the second article the importance of pandemic preparedness by the business community is emphasised. According to Dr. Robert Allen, Regional Medical Director of International SOS pandemic preparedness plans are an essential element of contingency plans for organisations.
Paul Arkwright
Publisher
