One in 4 workers still fears catching COVID-19 at work, although the percentage has continued to drop steadily in the latest Gallup poll.
Twenty-six percent of employed adults expressed concern, down from 33% in July and 36% a year ago. The rate has declined steadily from a high of 51% in July 2020, Gallup reported.
“Concern about exposure to COVID-19 at work continues to be more pronounced among women, Democrats, education workers and healthcare workers, than it is among their counterparts,” the pollster said.
The latest poll found that 38% of Democrats, 40% of education workers, 34% of healthcare workers and 33% of women are very or moderately concerned about catching COVID at work.
Just 21% of men, 26% of political independents and 9% of Republicans expressed the same fear.
A higher share of hybrid workers (31%) expressed fear of catching COVID in the workplace than on-site employees (27%) and exclusively remote workers (21%). That “may partly explain [hybrid workers’] reluctance to be in the office full time,” Gallup said.
Gallup surveyed a random national sampling of 1,174 adults with full-time or part-time jobs using self-administered web polls Oct. 11-19. The margin of error was plus or minus 2 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.
For more information, visit The Washington Times COVID-19 resource page.
• Sean Salai can be reached at ssalai@washingtontimes.com.
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