Irish employers urged to introduce menopause policies or pay price

https://www.euronews.com/business/2024/10/10/irish-businesses-could-be-hit-by-failure-to-introduce-menopause-policies

Posted by That_Technician_439

5 Comments

  1. SureItIsWhatItIs24 on

    >The event was founded to recognise businesses’ efforts to support female staff who are dealing with symptoms such as hormonal fluctuations, anxiety, sleep difficulties, poor concentration and memory lapses.

    >Workplace health provider Simplyhealth presented similar figures in their research in 2023, finding that almost a quarter (23%) of women in the UK have considered quitting due to the symptoms.

    I hear quite often that if a job is too much for someone, if it is having negative effects on their mental health and/or if it is causing them too much stress, that it is ok to walk away from it.

    I’m all for supporting people in the workplace. But if you’re not contributing as much as your equally paid colleagues, then something has got to give.

  2. So would this be a case of additional clauses in a Sick Leave policy? I’d hope it’s more a case of normalising taking sick days for menopausal symptoms than having no mechanism to deal with it at all.

    How would women approach this? If I were a woman in the workplace I’m not sure how comfortable I would be asking for a specific menopausal leave, or maybe that’s part of the issue.

    Rightly or wrongly, I’d imagine this is often already implemented in some cases “invisibly” by a generic GP note which just says ongoing illness where women don’t want their workplace to know the details.