A report from NPR last week caught my eye. The World Health Organization reported that working long hours poses an occupational health risk that kills hundreds of thousands of people each year.
No kidding.
A study published last week showed that people working 55 or more hours each week face an estimated 35% higher risk of a stroke and a 17% higher risk of dying from heart disease, compared to people following the widely accepted standard of working 35 to 40 hours in a week.
The global study found that in 2016, 488 million people were exposed to the risks of working long hours. In all, more than 745,000 people died that year from overwork that resulted in stroke and heart disease, according to the WHO.
The study noted that between 2000 and 2016, the number of deaths from heart disease due to working long hours increased by 42%, and from stroke by 19%.
The study doesn’t cover the past year, in which the COVID-19 pandemic thrust national economies into crisis and reshaped how millions of people work. But its authors note that overwork has been on the rise for years due to phenomena such as the gig economy and telework — and they say the pandemic will likely accelerate those trends.
“Teleworking has become the norm in many industries, often blurring the boundaries between home and work,” the report noted. “In addition, many businesses have been forced to scale back or shut down operations to save money, and people who are still on the payroll end up working longer hours.”
Also, recessions like the one the world has seen in the past year are commonly followed by a rise in working hours, the researchers said.
The study found the highest health burdens from overwork in men and in workers who are middle-age or older. Regionally, people in Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific region had the most exposure to the risk. People in Europe had the lowest exposure.
In the U.S., less than 5% of the population is exposed to long work hours.
The report did not specify how many of those affected were reporters, editors and page designers remaining at downsized newspapers.
Speaking of newspapers:
Shareholders of Tribune Publishing Company and its storied newspapers, including the Chicago Tribune, the Baltimore Sun and the New York Daily News, voted Friday to sell the company to Alden Global Capital, a hedge fund with a reputation for slashing staff and deep cost-cutting.
The Washington Post reported that Alden already owns around 200 titles including the Boston Herald, Mercury News, Denver Post and Los Angeles Daily News. The hedge fund has been buying newspapers since the 2007-2008 financial crisis and has since cut jobs in many newsrooms and sold off real estate assets to establish higher-than-average profit margins, the Post pointed out.
This is just another sad chapter in a troubling book. Newsroom employment at U.S. newspapers dropped 47% between 2008 and 2018, and the bleeding continues.
The Poynter Institute reported last year that at least 1,800 communities that had a local news outlet in 2004 were without one at the beginning of 2020.
And many newspapers remaining have skeleton staffs.
Entire photo staffs have been jettisoned, because anybody can take a photo, right? The number of reporters and copy editors/page designers have been cut, so there are fewer stories and more mistakes make it into print. Coverage areas shrink and page counts are reduced.
According to the Pew Research Center, a solid majority of Americans say their local news outlets report the news accurately, hold political leaders accountable and deal fairly with all sides. Unfortunately, that support has not been enough to ensure the survival of the news ecosystem in an age of truth decay, hyperpolarization and misinformation.
If local news goes out of business, the damage to our democracy will be severe and irreversible.
Perhaps that is why our founders made the right to publish and disseminate information, thoughts and opinions without restraint or censorship part of the First Amendment of our Constitution.