Nurses, store sales staff, newspaper distributors and cleaners were the professions with the highest frequency of coronavirus infections per size of occupational group last year, according to the results of a study conducted by the Helsinki Graduate School of Economics.
The report added that these professions are linked by the fact that they are all relatively low paid and there is little or no opportunity for telecommuting, or working from home.
Previous studies into the most at-risk occupational groups have found that sectors with the largest number of workers consequently have the highest number of infections.
Therefore, in its study, HGSE wanted to look at the number of infections in relation to the number of employees within each occupational group, according to Mika Kortelainen, Professor of Health Economics at the University of Turku, who led the research group.
"When looking at the relative infection rates, there are some quite surprising findings," Kortelainen said. "For example, painters and construction site cleaners have some of the highest levels of infection, and of course there are also healthcare professionals. But then there are professions that are less prominent in public debate, but they have quite a large number of infections in relative terms compared to the number of workers."
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The report also found that drivers, athletes and exercise instructors as well as kitchen workers and travel industry employees also had a disproportionately high rate of coronavirus infections.
Background factors also considered
The number of infections in proportion to the size of the occupational group gives an indication of the coronavirus risk associated with each profession, Kortelainen said, but the study was also influenced by various background factors of employees, such as age, gender, place of residence and origin.
"There are people of very different ages in different professions and it is well known that infections have not been equally divided amongst all age groups in Finland. Therefore, the consideration of age is important. Origin is also important in certain professional groups, because there are many people of foreign background in the construction industry, for example," Kortelainen said.
After taking into account the background factors and the size of the occupational group, the greatest risk for coronavirus infections was found to be among nurses and other healthcare professionals.
Kortelainen added that workers in other sectors should also be aware of the potential risks of infection.
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"It is important to note that the risks, for example among athletes and exercise instructors and drivers, as well as in the construction industry, can be surprisingly high," he said.
On the other hand, however, Kortelainen said that teachers were lower on the list than would have been assumed on the basis of public discussion.
"So far, teachers in Finland have not had very many infections. Of course, the situation may change a lot due to new virus variants, and in that sense, these results may not be applicable to the current situation," he said.
Higher education, salary no protection against infection
Researchers started from the assumption that higher rates of coronavirus infections are much more common in lower socio-economic groups and at lower income levels.
Kortelainen said this assumption proved to be correct: the rate of infection in Finland has been higher among people of lower income levels. However, he added that a higher level of education and better salary was no guarantee of protection against the virus.
"It was surprising that there were really a lot of coronavirus infections even at high income levels and among the highly educated," Kortelainen said.
Last spring in particular, infections spread quickly among high-income groups.
"The infections during the spring can be explained by the return of higher-income Finnish people from abroad, for example. These results confirm that one should not only be concerned about lower socio-economic groups, but also those with higher incomes, as they may also become ill and expose others," Kortelainen added.
The report's data on coronavirus infections came from the Infectious Diseases Register, which covered the period from 1 January to 22 November 2020. The occupational data came from the 2020 Income Register. Data on income and education are from 2018.