Wellness & Well-being Highlights May 21

Wellness & Well-being Highlights

for the

Week of May 21, 2023

This week’s edition of our Worker Wellness & Well-being blog consists of topics from the use of vending machines for Narcan to how “optional” perks from the past are now becoming “essential” for addressing employees’ MH to how recent inflationary pressures are impacting prison inmates. Today, I wish to shed some light on the issue of opening our borders so that qualified foreign workers can obtain gainful employment while filling areas where workforce shortages exist and are persistent. A number of developed countries (including Canada, Japan, and Germany…our allies) have recently tweaked their immigration policies in response to their aging populations (wherein birth rates have severely decreased over the past 3-4 decades). The USA is facing a similar situation but continues to resist a systemic approach to this dilemma. As a baby-boomer, sooner rather than later, I am concerned that not addressing this matter in a holistic manner will result in a lesser quality-of-life for not just me but our nation as a whole. In closing, let’s try to learn lessons from BJC’s foray into attracting nurses from abroad and expand this concept to other sectors of our economy…while trying NOT to kill the goose laying those golden eggs!

Sources: https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-worlds-biggest-economies-cautiously-open-their-doors-to-more-foreign-workers-664c3549

https://www.ksdk.com/video/news/health/faced-with-nursing-shortage-this-st-louis-hospital-is-looking-for-workers-abroad/63-3fe14f9e-ce87-4084-9835-ff936f8e0cde

MAY is Mental Health Awareness Month

Update: Overdose deaths (1)

Update: Overdose deaths (2)

Campaign to expand the MH workforce

Narcan vending machines

A new “War on Drugs”?

Police / Fentanyl / Risks

Teens / Drugs / Guns

On taking a MH day

Benefits of supporting others at work: Men v Women