Ahmedabad ranks third in the Assocham study on prevalence of lifestyle diseases among corporate employees. The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (Assocham) report states around 52 per cent of corporate employees are afflicted to lifestyle diseases especially of eating habits while 24 per cent suffer from chronic diseases whereas 18 per cent have acute ailment.
The survey covered major cities in the country like Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabd, Pune, Chandigarh, Dehradun etc. A little over 150 employees were selected from each city on an average.
Delhi ranked first afflicted to life-style diseases followed by Mumbai (second), Ahemdabad (third) Chandigarh (fourth), Hyderbad (fifth ), Pune (sixth ) and Channai (seventh). Only six per cent of average corporate employees claimed to not suffer from any disease, according to the report in which a total of 800 respondents participated from 150 companies in the age-bracket from 20-70 years.
Majority of the 52 per cent employees who are afflicted by life-style diseases are white collar executives who eat more often outside. Around 55 per cent of the respondents fall under the age bracket of 20-29 years, followed by 30-39 years (26 per cent), 40-49 years (16 per cent), 50-59 years (2 per cent) and 60-69 years (one per cent). While the report covered corporate employees from 18 broad sectors, the maximum share was contributed by employees from the IT and ITeS sectors (17 per cent respondents were from this sector).
After IT-ITeS sector, contribution of the study respondents from financial services is 11 per cent which includes the banking sector, stock brokerage houses, insurance sector, financial consultancy and chartered accountants. Employees working in engineering and telecom sector contributed nine per cent and eight per cent respectively. Nearly six per cent of the employees belonged from market research, KPO and media background each. Management, FMCG and Infrastructure sector employees share is five per cent each. Respondents from power and real estate sector contributed four per cent each. Employees from education and food& beverages sector provided a share of three per cent each. Advertising, manufacturing and textiles employees offered a share of two per cent each in the results.
Releasing the paper, the Assocham secretary general, D S Rawat said that 26 per cent of corporate employees suffer from obesity which is part of life style disease. Depression is the second hard hit disease that is observed among the respondents, with 18 per cent of the sample corporate employees suffering this life style disease. High blood pressure (B.P) and diabetes are the third and fourth largest disease with a share of 12 per cent and 10 per cent respectively as suffered among the corporate employees. Spondolysis (eight per cent), heart disease (six per cent), cervical (five per cent), asthma (four per cent), slip disk (three per cent) and arthritis (2.5 per cent) are the most common among diseases.
The report says that the increasingly demanding schedules and high stress levels are leading to sleep disorders in individual lives. Loss of sleep has wide ranging effects including daytime fatigue, physical discomfort, psychological stress, performance deterioration, low pain threshold and increased absenteeism.
It was interesting to note that employees in spite of suffering with an ailment (like influenza, fever, backache, etc) consider themselves healthy as they are able to pull themselves to work without adversely impacting productivity.
