Healthy Workers Only...

in the last printed edition of HealthWorks we presented the strategy of a major health care company to levy steep fines on employees who don’t comply with health standards.

Another approach to cut health-related costs is being followed by a major retail chain, according to online reports. They’re looking for young, healthy employees, and those
who are overweight, smoke, or have other high-risk life factors go to the bottom of the prospect list.

If you’ve ever dreamed of having a workforce consisting only of healthy, highly motivated workers, this scenario may be attractive. But when you think about it, it becomes apparent that trying to keep worker’s comp and health insurance costs down by hiring only healthy workers is a bad idea.

Here’s why:

In the first place, it won’t work. In Southwest Idaho we’re running at about 2.0 percent unemployment, and when the job market is that open, businesses can’t afford to be
so selective about their workforce that anyone with a health problem will be turned away.

Another reason it’s a bad idea is that costly legal issues, including the whole privacy arena, come into play when employers try to eliminate applicants who may not
follow totally healthful lifestyles when they’re not at work.

The most important reason that prehire health discrimination shouldn’t be considered is that it undermines the concept of shared risk that makes health insurance possible in the first place. Some companies are following the healthy employee model so far that they are going the self-insured route, taking people less likely to be sick out of the insurance pool.

Recognizing the negative consequences of hiring only “healthy” workers, some businesses are offering cash bonuses and other incentives for losing weight, exercising, eating right, and not using tobacco or alcohol.

But will extra cash discriminate unfairly against workers who don’t quite make the hit? Do they require managers to be judge, jury, watchman, and awards manager for activities that aren’t job related?

The most sensible way to deal with employees in an imperfect world is to stick to the workplace and the job in evaluating an employee’s fitness to work. Job descriptions need to spell out the requirements of specific tasks that are involved in each position.

Pre-employment testing or checking of references to be sure the employee can perform these tasks are also appropriate.

But let’s stay out of the worker’s life off the job. If he or she comes to work drug free and capable of handling specific work assignments, we have an acceptable worker on our team.