85 percent of occupational physicians involved in night work see people with complaints caused by working at night. This is the conclusion of a survey conducted by the Pointer journalistic platform (KRO-NCRV) and the Dutch Association for Occupational and Occupational Medicine (NVAB) among 213 occupational physicians who have clients who work at night. Night workers suffer from complaints such as sleeping problems and fatigue. Despite these figures, Minister Van Gennip says she does not consider it her task to further limit night work. According to her, this is the responsibility of companies.
But according to occupational physicians, companies take too little responsibility. Only 1 in 5 company doctors surveyed believes that companies do enough to prevent health problems caused by night work. Scientific research shows that night workers have a higher risk of sleep problems, cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes.
Health Council: limit night work
In 2017, the Health Council therefore advised the Minister of Social Affairs and Employment to ‘limit night work where possible’. But according to company doctors, this is still not enough. In the Netherlands, 1.3 million people sometimes or regularly work at night, especially in healthcare, transport and storage, catering and industry.
Report to employer
According to the survey, 66 percent of occupational physicians have questioned working at night with employers. Yet this only occasionally leads to structural improvements for employees. In practice, companies are particularly willing to (temporarily) adjust the work of individual employees on the advice of the company doctor if someone has complaints from working at night. Sometimes with a declaration of ‘unfitness for work’ as a result.
“I think we should try to prevent night work more,” said Boyd Thijssens, chairman of the NVAB, to KRO-NCRV’s Pointer. “Of course there are sectors where it is unavoidable, such as healthcare or the police. But I think it is taken for granted that this applies to all night work.” According to Thijssens, for example, a lot of work is done unnecessarily at night in distribution centers (‘ordered before 24 hours, delivered tomorrow’) and employers often prefer the economic interest to the health of employees.
Minister’s response
According to Minister Karien van Gennip (SZW), it is not a political responsibility to prevent night work that is not necessary. “The responsibility and consideration for deploying employees at night and taking proper measures if night work is necessary, lies with employers.”
Stricter regulations about when night work is or is not necessary, and may therefore be applied, is therefore not desirable, according to the minister. In response to the advice of the Health Council, at the request of the Ministry, an inventory has been made of which preventive measures employers can take to limit the adverse health effects of night work, such as power naps and a healthy diet.
Pointer, Sunday 5 March at 22:10 at KRO-NCRV on NPO2.
