La “desconexión digital” a lomos de la seguridad y salud en el trabajo

Abstract

The preponderance given to teleworking or remote work due to the health crisis is pushing to blur the line that separates effective work time from leisure and rest time. In the end, it practically causes the employee to never disconnect from work. And this is so because Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) push workers to have a constant time and location availability, even outside their working hours. In this sense, communications from bosses, co-workers or even clients through different means like now are not surprising: emails that need an urgent answer, phone calls at untimely hours or, especially in the sense of this article, through the smartphone, either by SMS messages -although it is true that, every time, in more disuse- or by messages through multiple instant messaging programs (applications such as WhatsApp, iMessage or Telegram). Not forgetting either that the smartphone has the possibility of incorporating corporate email accounts, which adds one more plus to this "hyperconnectivity" and that urgent and tiring feeling that causes the worker to respond immediately and without waiting for any communication he receives. This context requires a study on the negative consequences that workers may suffer from their safety and health. Psychosocial risks in this sense must be assessed by companies which, for their part, must comply with their preventive action enshrined in Law 31/1995, of November 8, on the prevention of occupational hazards.