Mental health still a taboo at work

Almost half of us would not be happy to discuss a mental health problem, according to a survey conducted by Comres for BBC Radio 5 live.

The survey asked 1,104 British adults in full-time employment about their attitudes to mental health. 49% said they would be unlikely to tell their boss about problems such as anxiety, depression or bipolar disorder. Only 35% said they would be happy to tell colleagues.

According to Sue Baker, director of mental health charity Time to Change, turning to your boss is not always the best course of action.

“We wouldn’t encourage people to routinely disclose,” she says. “Because obviously there’s still really poor practice.”

“It can result in people being passed over for promotion, not being offered opportunities to develop themselves, and to outright discriminatory comments.” She advises people to speak up only if it’s clear your employer is supportive of mental health programs.

However, she says there are now more 500 employers taking positive action, including signing up to the Time to Change pledge, which commits them to address the taboos around mental health.

“It costs industry more to ignore mental health and shove it under the carpet than to deal with it,” says Ms Baker.

In a typical country, one in five people suffers from a mental illness, according to an article on the economics of mental health by Lord Richard Layard. Mental illness accounts for half of all illness up to age 45 in rich countries, making it the most prevalent disease among working-age people. Lord Layard writes, “Mentally ill people are less likely to be employed and, if employed, more likely to be out sick or working below par. If mentally ill people received the same treatment so that they had the same employment rate as the rest of the population, total employment would be 4% higher, adding many billions to national output.”

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