The working wounded

From today's edition of The Globe and Mail:

Mental illness is costing the Canadian economy a staggering $51-billion a year, and each day 500,000 people miss work because of psychiatric problems. What are employers doing about it? Not much.

To read the entire story, click here.

Sylvie Giasson, a Health Canada worker in Ottawa, [lives with] severe depression/anxiety disorder. (Brigitte Bouvier for the Globe and Mail)

By the numbers:

1 Rank of depression among the leading causes of disability in the world.

8% Percentage of workers taking medication in Canada to treat depression and other mental-health conditions.

20.6% Percentage of workers who suffer a bout of mental illness, most in the prime of their working lives

40% Percentage of short- and long-term disability claims that involve a mental-health problem.

60% Percentage drop in family income when a breadwinner is diagnosed with mental illness.

500,000 Number of workers off sick each day in Canada with mental-health problems.

$8.5-billion Amount that employers and insurers spend each year on long-term disability claims related to Mental illness.

$9.3-billion Annual cost of short-term leave for mental-health problems.

$51-billion Amount that mental illness costs the Canadian economy each year.

Sources: World Health Organization, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Canadian Public Health Agency, Great-West Life Centre for Mental Health in the Workplace, Statistics Canada