Unfair treatment: the killer in the workplace

Human beings have a fundamental need to be treated fairly. Now, a piece of research conducted among thousands of civil servants in London for more than a decade suggests that unfair treatment in the workplace can actually kill, says my That's Men for You column in today's Irish Times.

The research among British civil servants was conducted by a team led by Dr Roberto De Vogli at University College London. The numbers and the time scale for the research are impressive: more than 8,000 civil servants in London were studied over an average period of eleven years.

The researchers found that those who said they had been treated unfairly were 50% more likely than their colleagues to say that their physical or mental health was poor.

More alarmingly, they were 55% more likely to have had a heart attack or symptoms of heart disease.

According to the report on this research in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, other studies have found that where an employing organisation insists on fair treatment of its workforce, the likelihood of heart disease actually falls.

Fairness you might say saves lives; unfairness can kill. Perhaps it can do worse than kill: there is reason to believe that hypertension, as measured by high blood pressure, can contribute to the risk of developing Alzheimer’s Disease.

There's more on the research in this story on the website of the Men's Health Forum for England and Wales.....

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