In Europe, the relationship between mental health and work is debated

While the pension reform has brought the issue of being ill at work to the forefront of the media scene, recognition of the occupational nature of mental illness is far from reaching a consensus in Europe, notes Eurogip. In its latest report, published in May, this observatory, which was created by Health Insurance-Occupational Risks, discussed the way in which several European countries have adopted this issue.

Like France, only a few of our neighbors have opened the door to recognizing pathologies such as depression or burnout as occupational diseases: Denmark, Spain, Italy and Sweden.

Degraded working conditions – harassment, overwork, etc. are questioned. It is difficult to objectively measure the impact on the worker’s mental health, and extra-professional factors can also affect it. Germany, Austria and Switzerland exclude this possibility.

Very different evaluation criteria

The only country to include two mental disorders – post-traumatic stress and depression in veterans – in the list of occupational diseases (without excluding the examination of the listed pathologies), Denmark ranks first among countries that report more. Request for recognition and recognized cases. But with a lower rate of recognition of mental illness (7%) than in Italy (10%) and especially than in France, where the rate reaches 52% (in the private sector).

Filings in the French system are much lower (16 applications per 100,000 insured on average, compared to 162 in Denmark), but are evaluated on a case-by-case basis by the Regional Committees for the Recognition of Occupational Diseases (CRRMP). . It is tempting to interpret these recognition rates as an illustration of the degree of openness of the occupational mental illness recognition system.– say the authors of the study.

These indicators also include very different evaluation criteria from one country to another. “Jurisprudential interpretations of what constitutes an occupational accident, on the one hand, and regulatory procedures for the recognition of occupational diseases, on the other hand, also open this gap in terms of demand and recognition”emphasizes Eurogip.

In France, the law sets a permanent disability rate of at least 25% in the case of a recognized occupational disease, implying serious and irreversible psychological damage to victims who are not always able to prosecute.