Long Covid having modest impact on labour inactivity, MSPs told

Long Covid may be contributing to long-term sickness but its impact on labour market inactivity is modest, MSPs have heard.

Longer-term trends mean the number of people in Scotland not active in the workforce has been rising since 2015, a Holyrood committee was told.

There is nevertheless evidence that long Covid is contributing to long-term sickness in the UK.

UK-wide data shows 5% of people who were not in and not looking for paid work had self-reported long Covid.

There is some evidence to suggest the prevalence of long Covid may be slightly higher in Scotland than the rest of the UK.

Within the private household population, 3.83% in Scotland self-reported long Covid in July compared to 2.98% in England.

Previous research on long Covid has highlighted that those with the condition often go on sick leave rather than dropping out of the labour market altogether.

David Freeman, of the Office for National Statistics, was among a group of researchers who gave evidence to the Covid-19 Recovery Committee on Thursday.

He said: “In Scotland the number of inactive young people – 16 to 24 – has actually fallen and is now below where it was pre-pandemic.

“What’s been similar in both Scotland and the UK is the rise in inactive 50-plus people.

“Long Covid does appear to be contributing to that increase in long-term sick.

“There already had been a large number of people who were inactive because of long-term sickness prior to the pandemic.”

Around 5% of economically inactive people had long Covid, he said.

The most recent data for Scotland has the working age inactivity rate at 22%.

Professor Steve Fothergill, of Sheffield Hallam University, said it is “crucially important” to remember that high levels of economic inactivity is not a new phenomenon.

He said: “What the pandemic has actually done is only tweak that phenomenon a little bit higher.

“Yes, long Covid may contribute to the modest increases that we’ve seen during and after the pandemic.”

Hannah Randolph, of the Fraser of Allander Institute, noted that Scotland’s labour market inactivity rate ceased falling in 2015, a trend at odds with the rest of the UK until the pandemic hit.

She said: “There’s likely something else going on in Scotland that’s causing that inactivity, other than the pandemic.”