Impact of COVID-19 Lockdown on Sun Exposure of UK Office Workers

Abstract

The impact of lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic in April–June 2020 on UV exposure of office workers was assessed using an online survey on time spent outdoors and environmental data for different locations in the UK. Without the need for commuting and with the flexibility of homeworking, weekday time spent outdoors was higher in the 2020 lockdown than in the same period in 2017. The weekday erythema effective radiant exposure was higher in 2020 due to an additional 45 min outdoors in the late afternoon that was not observed in 2017 and high UV levels due to extremely sunny weather in spring. The lockdown did not impact the frequency of time spent outdoors around midday, which was still governed by work commitments, and at the weekends, no difference between 2020 and 2017 was observed. In 2020, responders felt that time outdoors was very important for their health and well-being.

Time Spent Outdoors and Associations with Sleep, Optimism, Happiness and Health before and during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Austria

“…Thus, this study population may not be comparable to our samples, which were representative of the Austrian population and, therefore, were overall older and had a higher proportion of men. By contrast, a study [ 28 ] in UK office workers found a significant increase in TSO during the 2020 lockdown; the authors explain this surprising result by the flexibility of homeworking and extremely sunny weather in spring 2020.…”

Prevention of Health Risks Related to Occupational Solar Ultraviolet Radiation Exposure in Times of Climate Change and COVID-19 Pandemic

“…Finally, it has to be mentioned that there is also a possible paradoxical effect of lockdown measures and telework, even increasing SUVR exposure for some categories of subjects, as recently reported [24]. In fact, many subjects felt confined to their homes/offices, and some of them possibly reacted by increasing their time outside whenever possible.…”

“…In addition to climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic and, in particular, the cultural and behavioral changes induced by the pandemic and the preventive measures taken to prevent the spread of the virus have relevantly modified the way we perceive outdoor activities. Furthermore, the pandemic has determined profound changes in work organization, e.g., highly increasing telework [22,23], even if it should be noted that this does not necessarily indicate a reduction in SUVR exposure [24]. On the one hand, the lock-down measures and the restrictions of various job activities may have somewhat reduced the risk of excessive SUVR exposure for classic outdoor professions, such as gardeners or masons, at least for some months.…”