Long COVID's Effects on Workplace Safety
By Kay Bechtold
The lingering effects of long COVID can affect workplace safety, and occupational and environmental health and safety professionals are in a position to do something about it, Caitlin Lang, MA, explained during a pop-up session on May 20 at AIHA Connect 2025. Lang, a senior research associate with the National Safety Council, described long COVID as a chronic illness with a range of symptoms that can persist weeks or months after SARS-CoV-2 infection. Long COVID can cause more than 200 symptoms and affect all organ systems in the body, she said, pointing out that respiratory problems are among some of the more common symptoms of the illness. Individuals with long COVID also experience symptoms such as cognitive impairment or “brain fog,” chronic fatigue, and musculoskeletal pain. Symptoms of long COVID “can come and go,” Lang said, which makes them difficult to track or predict. She cautioned that long COVID can occur even after a mild infection.
Long COVID can affect workers’ performance. For example, individuals with long COVID may become less consistent at work, have trouble with focus or memory, or experience reduced physical stamina. Symptoms like brain fog especially can compromise safety in roles that require alertness. Lang stressed that long COVID can create safety risks across work settings: from safety-sensitive roles in high-risk industries like construction or healthcare, “where even momentary lapses in concentration and physical stamina can present risk,” to low-risk settings like remote or hybrid offices, where decision-making difficulties or memory lapses “can create missed deadlines or misunderstandings” and affect teams’ performance in other ways. For workers in medium-risk scenarios who must stand for prolonged periods or whose tasks involve light lifting, long COVID can increase the risk of musculoskeletal disorders; according to Lang, repetitive stress injuries can be more common among those with long COVID.
Long COVID should not be regarded “as a personal health issue in any work setting,” she said. “It’s important to treat long COVID as part of a standard risk management framework, as you would other chronic conditions that can affect safety and performance.”
Lang urged attendees to proactively incorporate long COVID into safety and health initiatives and risk assessment. As part of a job task analysis, for example, OEHS professionals can review physical and cognitive demands of specific roles and identify critical tasks that require physical exertion or rapid response from workers. And because many managers may not understand how symptoms like brain fog or fatigue can affect safety, Lang suggested training to help supervisors and teams learn to recognize and respond appropriately to chronic health symptoms. OEHS professionals should also consider that certain environmental or operational factors—like heat, noise, shift length, or pace of work—have the potential to exacerbate these symptoms.
“These conditions may be tolerable for a healthy employee but could be dangerous for someone with long COVID or another chronic condition,” Lang said.
Due to the duration and unpredictable nature of long COVID symptoms, some workers with the illness may need an intermittent or prolonged adjustment period upon their return to work or more long-term job modifications, Lang continued. Together with human resources personnel, OEHS professionals can help ensure that an organization’s health, safety, and productivity objectives are aligned and that sick leave and return-to-work policies do not unintentionally stigmatize or penalize affected workers. Lang said that employers are recognizing that recovery from long COVID is not linear and discovering that phased returns and simple accommodations can help provide stability for both the worker and the organization.
“Proactive planning is essential,” Lang said. It not only “improves safety for entire organizations but helps keep affected individuals in the workplace.”
Kay Bechtold is managing editor of The Synergist.
Read more coverage of AIHA Connect 2025.
