London mayor Sadiq Khan formally introduced menopause leave for City Hall staff last week, after exclusively revealing plans to Metro.co.uk last year during his re-election campaign.
Employees at London City Hall will also have a range of reasonable adjustments on offer to them, including ‘temperature-controlled areas’ to tackle hot flushes.
Khan said he hopes the initiative will be picked up by other workplaces as he aims to break the ‘last workplace taboo’ — but how much is the taboo around menopause impacting working people?
According to the Faculty of Occupational Medicine, almost eight out of 10 of menopausal women are in work. However, studies suggest that they aren’t getting the support they need.
Research unveiled in January revealed that almost a million women in the UK were considering leaving their job because of a lack of support during the menopause, while a BBC survey found that 70% of women experiencing the menopause did not tell their bosses they were experiencing symptoms.
The menopause describes the change a person with a uterus experiences when they stop having periods and their reproductive cycle ends.
The physical and hormonal changes associated with this transition can cause hot flushes, low energy, issues with concentration, headaches, urinary tract infections, and insomnia.
Symptoms of menopause can last up to 15 years, with one in four women experiencing these to a ‘severely debilitating’ level.
Mental health can also suffer as a result. Dr Nighat Arif, a GP with specialist training in women’s health, previously told Vogue that ‘the rough statistics are that one in four women experiencing menopause will try to commit suicide,’ while the Office of National Statistics found that women between 50 and 54 years old — around the age bracket that many go through menopause — had the highest suicide rate.
Low mood and anxiety is a common symptom of the menopause, while several other studies show links between the menopause and depression, as well as other mental health issues such as psychosis.
Sally Baker, Senior Therapist with Perimenopause Hub, tells Metro.co.uk: ‘Official acknowledgement of how menopause symptoms can impact a woman’s physical, emotional, and mental health has the potential to lift the stigma, silence, and shame women frequently feel at work for what is after all, a natural phase in the lives of women.
‘In tandem with physical symptoms, the psychological challenges of the menopause are often little understood or overlooked. Increased levels of anxiety and low mood regularly top the list of symptoms that have the biggest impact on life.
‘In the workplace this often manifests as imposter syndrome, meaning women who are at the top of their professional game suddenly start to doubt their abilities.’
Can you get leave or reasonable adjustments at work due to the menopause?
Although City Hall appears to be the first high-profile workplace in the UK to offer specific ‘menopause leave,’ all people experiencing menopause are protected to an extent under the law.
Under the 2010 Equality Act, it is illegal for employers to discriminate against somebody due to a protected characteristic, such as gender and disability.
If menopause causes you to have profound physical or mental health issues that impact your ability to function, you can be considered as having a disability under this law.
This in turn means your employer has the responsibility by law to make reasonable adjustments in the workplace for you. If they fail to do so, or act in a way that makes you feel discriminated against on the basis of your disability, this is illegal.
Gender and age are also protected characteristics under this Act. Consequently, because the menopause is a process that happens exclusively to assigned females at birth in a specific age bracket, the same legal responsibilities and protection surrounding reasonable adjustments once again apply.
As well as this, the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 dictates that an employer must, where reasonably practical, ensure everyone’s health, safety and welfare at work, something that extends to the physical and mental working conditions for those going through the menopause.
ACAS guidance suggests employers consider awareness training for managers about what the menopause is and its symptoms, as well as sensitively handling absences and changes in work performance, implementing a wellbeing-based point of contact for the employee, and making reasonable adjustments to the workplace to ensure the employee isn’t adversely impacted.
Some examples of reasonable adjustments include allowing the employee to work flexibly, recording absence for menopausal symptoms separately from the employee’s other absences, giving the employee more breaks, adjusting their workload, or moving the employee’s workspace to a cooler or more ventilated area.
‘Recognising the challenges working women face experiencing menopause symptoms is an important step in helping potentially 3.5 million women over the age of 50 feel supported in their workplace,’ Sally added.
‘The more we can increase menopause awareness, in and out of the workplace, the more we can support these amazing women to achieve to the best of their ability.’
MORE : Women to be given groundbreaking ‘menopause leave’ at London’s City Hall
MORE : ‘I had no choice but to resign’: Women share the difficulties of going through menopause at work
Sign up to our guide to what’s on in London, trusted reviews, brilliant offers and competitions. London’s best bits in your inbox
Share this with