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Frankfurt (dpa / lhe) - Hessian health care workers were absent significantly more often in the pandemic year due to mental illness than in 2019. This was the result of an evaluation by the health insurance company DAK-Gesundheit, which is available to the German press agency.

In 2020, there were an average of 378 days of absence due to mental illness for every 100 insured persons, an increase of around 14 percent.

In no other industry has absenteeism increased so much.

"The health care system is stretched to the limit, and so is the workforce," explained Sötkin Geitner, DAK regional director in Hesse.

In the administrative sector - which still recorded the most days of absence due to mental illness in 2019 - the value fell to 303. The Hesse-wide average was 262 days of absence per 100 insured persons, which was roughly the same as last year.

In terms of the duration of the failure, Hessen was absent last year for longer than ever before.

Mentally ill people stayed away from work for an average of 38 days in 2020, three days longer than in the previous year.

The differences between the sexes also remained large.

For every 100 women there were an average of 315 days of absence, for men it was 218 days.

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As in the previous year, depression was responsible for most absent days among mental illnesses (106 per 100 insured persons), but the value fell slightly.

According to the report, adjustment disorders (reactions to stressful life events) gained importance in the pandemic as the second most common diagnosis, the days of absence rose by 6 percent to 60 per 100 insured persons.

The report by the DAK health insurance company is based on representative data from more than 272,000 DAK insured persons in Hesse, which the Berlin IGES Institute has evaluated.

A total of 640,000 Hessen are insured with DAK-Gesundheit.

© dpa-infocom, dpa: 210327-99-992285 / 2

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