Over the years, dependency on drugs (legal/illegal) by people in the workforce has increased. This rise in substance abuse not only affects the user, and impair job performance, but also costs employers in the UK billions of pounds annually due to inefficient job performance, workplace accidents, and absenteeism.
This excellent infographic from Addiction Helper, the UK’s Number 1 Addiction Resource site, includes interesting stats about the impact of substance abuse in the workplace.
According to research, a large proportion of work-related accidents are instigated by workers under the influence of substances like alcohol, opiates and heroin. 60% of poor performance in the workplace and 40% of all accidents in the workplace are related to substance use/abuse.
70% of individuals who abuse drugs are employed full time. About 17% of the workforce in the UK is made up of illicit drug users, and each year, 3 million of these employees clock in at work under the influence of substance like narcotics, opiates and others. In addition, an estimated 24% of workers have drunk alcohol during work hours at least once in the past year and 15% of workers are occasionally drunk at work.
The UK economy is reported to lose £21 billion to alcohol abuse and £15 billion to drug abuse each year, and employers lose about £7.3 billion yearly due to lack of productivity as a result of the misuse of alcohol.
When interviewed, 1 in 10 small businesses disclosed they had experienced an employee under the effect of drugs during work hours.
Hygiene UK are specialists in the field of workplace substance of abuse testsing and policy development, and support an array of customers across various sectors with…
- On-site rapid tests that detect for multi-drugs and alcohol > results in minutes.
- UKAS accredited lab-based evidential tests for drugs and alcohol > returning results in 3 days (soon to be 24 hours!).
- Drug & Alcohol policies > robust policies are a must to help comply with increasingly demanding health & safety and HR requirements