Working while sick is up there with some of the worst experiences possible. But working while sick in the food service industry is a match made in hell, which is further exacerbated by bosses that refuse to believe that someone is sick in the first place. So one would think that managers in restaurants and catering companies would take employee illness quite seriously, but as so often happens, incompetence prevails.

One waiter shared his tale of malicious compliance when he was ordered to come in despite being quite sick. Given no other choice, he showed up to work and fairly quickly made the manager regret his decision.

Managers in the food service industry should know better than to make sick employees work

Image credits: voronaman111 (not the actual photo)

A waiter detailed the time they maliciously complied with a boss that refused to believe he was sick

Image credits: Louis Hansel (not the actual photo)

Image credits: Any-Ad8016

Working while sick is unfortunately quite common in the food industry

Surprising absolutely no one, health authorities in most countries recommend that food service staff stay at home if sick. Evidently, the only people who don’t think this is an issue are the individuals in charge of managing these establishments, as per OP’s story. However, unfortunately, they do have a somewhat twisted leg to stand on in certain places. For example, in the US, the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Food Code, which provides the basis for state and local food codes, “recommends that food workers with foodborne illness symptoms such as vomiting and diarrhea don’t work. The Food Code also recommends that food workers report specific symptoms and diagnoses to their managers so the manager can determine if the food worker should not work.”

The eagle-eyed among you will notice two things, first, that the CDC only recommends a sick worker stay at home and that managers should still make the call at the end of the day. Despite the very common sense risks, not to mention that a sick worker will simply be less effective, managers can and do make people stay on the job. Studies conducted in the US show that a staggering 60% of people who work around food have reported being sick at their place of employment. In some cases, workers preferred to not lose out on income and didn’t inform their managers, however roughly 20% reported vomiting and having diarrhea at the workplace, which, as OP’s story shows, is a bit harder to hide.

Image credits: Polina Tankilevitch (not the actual photo)

The health risks definitely superseded the restaurant’s labor needs

The result is that a single bad decision by a manager can put the entire staff and really all the guests at risk at the same time. An overview of disease outbreaks resulting from restaurants has found that in most cases, one ill worker was enough to start an outbreak, regardless of the cleanliness of the restaurant in question. After Covid 19, we should all be quite aware of just how fast something can spread from just a few individuals. One sick waiter infects a handful of patrons, leading to multiple families and workplaces also being hit with a disease. The same study found that in Wales, staff were aware of the risks, but could not do anything about it due to a lack of time and resources. In other words, management did not have a clear plan for what to do if an employee was sick, which by and large is a pretty normal situation.

In the US, some states don’t even require an employee health plan, despite the recommendations of the CDC. Researchers on the topic generally agree that CDC recommendations are simply being ignored or in many cases, managers are not even aware. However, the basic fact that a sick person can get others sick does not need the CDC to propagate it. Similar studies in other countries have come to the same conclusions, ultimately endangering many people to profit the business’s bottom line.

Image credits: Polina Tankilevitch (not the actual photo)

OP gave a few more details

Other readers applauded his actions and shared their own stories of horrible managers

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