Index of NHS hospital staff sickness absence rate, by reason, January 2016 to May 2025 (January 2016=100)

A line chart from the Institute for Government showing Index of NHS hospital staff sickness absence rate, by reason, January 2016 to May 2025 (January 2016=100). Mental health-related absences have risen steadily since 2016, reaching an index of around 166 by mid-2025. All other reasons remained near baseline until the pandemic, spiking during 2022 before returning to roughly 115.

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Source: Institute for Government analysis of NHS Digital, ‘NHS sickness absence rates’ ('Table 2: Count'), May 2025.Notes: Data is not available before 2015. Details on how figure have been produced are provided in the Methodology chapter. This shows England only. It shows a rolling 12-month average to smooth out seasonality. "All other reasons" includes respiratory and other infectious diseases.Get the dataEmbed Download image

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