Flu season has office workers taking cover

Are you sneezing or hacking? It could make you persona non grata in the workplace. Workers are dodging colleagues with cold and flu in what could be one of the worst flu seasons in years. Others are urging colleagues to go home – and are chagrined when they don’t, spreading their germs at work. “I don’t want to sit near that person – they’re coming down with a cold or flu” has been the sentiment of co-workers in a meeting who hear someone coughing, said Janet Wincko, human resources director for City Furniture, a retailer based in Tamarac, Fla. The Centers for Disease Control estimates that, on average, seasonal flu outbreaks cost the nation’s employers $10.4 billion in direct costs of hospitalizations and outpatient visits. That doesn’t include the indirect costs related to lost productivity and absenteeism. And the flu season “is shaping up to be a bad season compared to last year.