"Overtime work models" lack awareness of health

A survey by www.ce.cn talked to 60 staff at Beijing Shangdi International Venture Park in Haidian District, the city's hi-tech complex. The results show 48 of the respondents said they have symptoms of working long hours, and 65 percent of them said they had medical problems but they didn't have time to go to the doctor.

Sun Ningyu, 29, quit her job as an account manager for a Beijing public relations company so that she could have medical treatment in 2004. The doctor said she had "over-time working symptoms", which is also known as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS).

Although Sun earned 100,000 yuan a year, she suffered from diarrhea, lightheadedness and insomnia when she first fell ill. "I just felt like my soul left my body. I took various medicines, but I didn't get better."

Sun's situation isn't the most serious. Thirty-three-year-old Du Jichun, the top teacher of a primary school in Yanji of Northeast China's Jinlin Province, died earlier this March in front of the class after ignoring abdominal pains during his last class.

Ouyang Xiaoxue, an official with the China Health Care Association lists 10 signals of having "over-time work symptoms":
1. beer belly
2. loss of hair
3. frequently going to the toilet
4. unable to have sex
5. loss of memory
6. easily distracted
7. bad tempered and fidgets easily
8. insomnia
9. headache, humming in the ears or lightheadedness
10. unable to do mental arithmetic easily

Ouyang continues to explain that if one has any two of the 10 symptoms, there is no need to panic; if one has three to five of them, there is cause for concern; but if one has six or more, it could be dangerous.

"'Over-worked models' need to pay more attention their bodies and get the health care they need," Ouyang warned.

Loophole in legal protection and security system

The labor law stipulates that people should work no more than eight hours a day; if they need to do overtime, they should only do three extra hours per day, and no more than 36 hours a month. The emergence of "overtime working models" apparently breaks the law.

However, the law doesn't help those white-collared workers in whose careers have cut-throat competition. So employers feel free to push their employees to work longer hours - or even toil to death -- because the law does not say anything about related compensation.

But the law isn't enough to protect employees. "White-collared workers need to understand the reason why they have to work extra work hours and pay attention to their health," said Liu Xinwen, professor of China University of Political Science and Law.

"Some foreign companies have mental health care, which is rare in domestic companies. Under this condition, a healthy mind depends on the employees themselves," said Wang Fang, a graduate student at Beijing Normal University.

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