"Can students afford to be sick?" - see the seminar afterwards!

Here you can watch the conversation afterwards.

Students are overrepresented when it comes to mental illness, and financial insecurity is a contributing factor. Partly because it can be expensive to be sick.

In practice, students can not be on part-time sick leave, unlike people who work, are unemployed or on parental leave. A student on part-time sick leave can usually only receive study grants for the time he is studying, and not compensation for the time he is on sick leave.

Students also have an unusually long waiting period and can only have the loan part written off in the study grant after 30 days. Do students have the financial means to be sick? What is the role of social security systems in counteracting mental illness among students?

Panel:
Dolores Fors, vice chairman of Uppsala Student Union
Björn Petersson (S), Member of Parliament in the Social Insurance Committee.
Angelica Börjesson, senior lecturer at the University of Borås
Carin Nyman, researcher at Karolinska Institutet.

Moderator: Albert Ohlin, Chairman of the Saco Student Council