Researchers at University of Chile Have Reported New Data on Pandemics (The Effect of the 2009 Influenza Pandemic on Absence from Work)

By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at TB & Outbreaks Week -- A new study on Epidemiology - Pandemics is now available. According to news reporting originating from Santiago, Chile, by NewsRx correspondents, research stated, "In July 2009, the World Health Organization declared the first flu pandemic in nearly 40?years. Although the health effects of the pandemic have been studied, there is little research examining the labor productivity consequences."

Funders for this research include RAND Bing Center for Health Economics, National Institutes of Health (see also Epidemiology - Pandemics).

Our news editors obtained a quote from the research from the University of Chile, "Using unique sick leave data from the Chilean private health insurance system, we estimate the effect of the pandemic on missed days of work. We estimate that the pandemic increased mean flu days missed by 0.042?days per person-month during the 2009 peak winter months (June and July), representing an 800% increase in missed days relative to the sample mean."

According to the news editors, the research concluded: "Calculations using the estimated effect imply a minimum 0.2% reduction in Chile's labor supply."

For more information on this research see: The Effect of the 2009 Influenza Pandemic on Absence from Work. Health Economics, 2017;():. (Wiley-Blackwell - www.wiley.com/; Health Economics - onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/(ISSN)1099-1050)

The news editors report that additional information may be obtained by contacting F. Duarte, Dept. of Economics, University of Chile, Santiago, Chile. Additional authors for this research include S. Kadiyala, S.H. Masters and D. Powell.

Keywords for this news article include: Chile, Santiago, Influenza, Pandemics, Epidemiology, South America.

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