15% of U.S. Worker Shortage Due to Long-Lasting COVID, Study Says

TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) – For most of the United States, COVID-19 has come and gone, but for some patients, prolonged COVID has become a persistent set of symptoms even after the infection clears. . As the United States continues its economic recovery, new data shows that prolonged COVID may also be affecting the labor market.

Prolonged COVID, also called long-distance or post-COVID according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is when patients experience “a wide range of ongoing health problems,” sometimes for weeks , months or years after recovering from a serious illness. COVID-19 disease.

According to CDC data, as of August 8, between 14% and 15.4% of US residents have experienced COVID for a long time. Depending on the state in which patients lived, the likelihood of having prolonged COVID was higher, such as in Florida, where the percentage ranged from 15.4% to 21.5% as of August 8, compared to the national range that reached 15.4%.

However, the data used by the CDC has some caveats, because its source comes from the June-July National Household Pulse Survey conducted by the US Census Bureau.

The Brookings Institution, an American nonprofit research organization based in Washington, examined employment data and trends during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Brookings analysis reported that as many as 16.3 million working-age US citizens, ages 18 to 65, have long-standing COVID. The number of working-age residents with prolonged COVID was obtained from the census survey. According to the Brookings Institution, the number of workers who have long-term COVID is equivalent to about 8% of Americans old enough to work.

The study said that 2-4 million were not working out as a result. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics shows in its recent Job Vacancies and Job Turnover report for June that there were 10.7 million job openings in the country today.

Using available data, Brookings reported that up to 15% of open positions in the US were vacant at a “conservative estimate” as a result of long-running COVID. A new JOLT report from the BLS is expected on August 30.