5 For Friday: Hold on to Your Health

Laleh Hassibi, PayScale

With flu season hitting us hard and plenty of people coughing and oozing all around us, a focus on the buzz around staying healthy at work seemed appropriate. It’s also National Heart Month, so there are great ideas floating around the internet to help you get back to good health. Here are five of our favorites.

5 Ways to Make Your Workweek Healthier, Valerie Cecil, US Business Week
We all are guilty of falling into unhealthy habits during the workweek, and this article gives us 5 things to avoid, notably: going out for lunch, letting stress get the best of us, sitting for hours on end (try a standing desk), the vending machine and wasting our breaks staring mindlessly at our smartphones.

Canadians High Stress Levels Can’t be Chalked Up to Winter Weather, Davida Ander, National Post
In an area with winters as cold as Canada’s, it’s easy to point fingers at winter weather as the cause for the blues. But, in this study 46% of Canadians surveyed reported that their stress is not specific to a time of year. And even though they mostly know that good health can help combat the effects of stress, many still tend to stay away from exercise and make unhealthy food choces.

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Employers Should Look After Health at Work, Jennifer Paterson, Employee Benefits
British employees (68%) believe that their employers should take responsibility for general health at work. With 60% of our day spent at work, having employers make health and wellbeing an essential part of the working day could make a major difference in all of our lives.

Supporters of Paid Sick Time Demonstrate at Downtown Starbucks, Jordan Steffen, The Denver Post
Have you ever been guilty of coming to work sick? Many people do it because they don’t get paid for sick time. This was just one of many articles about protests on the subject happening around the country. Without paid sick time, workers are forced to choose between taking care of their health or going to work. Providing paid sick days would minimize the number of sick employees who come to work.

How to Avoid Getting the Flu at Work, Claire Suddath, Businessweek
Do you have people sniffling and wheezing around you at your office, or coughing on you in the elevator? The U.S. is having the worst flu outbreak since the swine flu pandemic. The flu shot is the obvious prevention answer, but there are some other whacky remedies floating around like listening to jazz music to boost your immune system. Your best hope is that coworkers stay home if they are sick, but in lieu of that crank up some Kenny G and do your best to avoid the snot molecules in the air.