2023-07-10 18:40:10
The pandemic and the cases of long Covid foreshadowed a massive increase in the number of AI annuities. But three years following the start of the pandemic, of the 4,571 people registered with AI, only a little over a hundred received a pension, RTS learned.
The hundred requests for AI pensions granted because of long Covid may surprise three years following the start of the pandemic. But this figure, still provisional, might be brought to evolve in the coming years, as indicated by the Disability Insurance which will publish its official report soon.
It must be said that around a hundred patients still register for AI each month because of the long Covid. A disease that most often results in persistent fatigue, neurological, cardiac or psychiatric disorders.
Lots of time to process requests
Not to mention that the AI takes many months to make a decision on the granting of a pension, deplores Monday in La Matinale Chantal Britt, president of the Long Covid Switzerland Association.
“Regarding the answers for the reintegration or reintegration of people, we receive them quite quickly. But for pensions, it can take a year, sometimes up to eighteen months. It takes time, because the cases are very complicated .”
>> Listen to the full interview with Chantal Britt in La Matinale:
A hundred AI pensions granted for Covid long: interview with Chantal Britt / La Matinale / 1 min. / today at 06:20
Rehabilitation measures
This relatively low number of pensioners may also be due to the fact that the AI tries to keep people in employment by offering them rehabilitation measures. This is for example what was put in place for Dorothée, 43 years old. Before falling ill, at the very beginning of the pandemic, she worked 80% as a librarian and was training as a mountain guide. Today, she suffers in particular from extreme fatigue.
“I never imagined that I was going to have to enroll one day at the AI. For two and a half years, I more or less managed to work but I still had several stops”, says- she at the microphone of La Matinale. But a violent relapse during the summer of 2022 turned everything upside down by forcing her to register with the AI.
“It was a big step, especially since at the start of 2020, I told myself that I was going to have two jobs at the same time, mountain guide and librarian, and that I was going to have to juggle between the two. So obviously , it’s very difficult psychologically.”
It was then that she met Delphine Dafflon, her AI-mandated coach, whom she sees once a week. Since then, she has been able to return to work at 20%. And the idea is to reach 30% by the end of October.
“AI support brings me a lot of things. My coach knows the disease well, she can mediate with the employer and she sometimes relieves me of a certain mental burden. Everything is accounted for when you are in long Covid The fatigue is so strong, so if you can gain a little energy somewhere, that’s what allows you to return to work in good conditions”, she rejoices.
The case of Dorothée is classic, explains Delphine Dafflon, who comes to the aid of six people suffering from long Covid. “There are realities which are quite terrible at the professional level, because people lose their jobs. The reintegration measure makes it possible to suspend the time limit for the end of treatment and thus to take charge of the salaries by the AI.” The six people they care for have all been able to increase their work capacity.
The patience required
But you have to be patient: “As soon as you go too fast, it doesn’t hold, you lose what you have learned”, continues Delphine Dafflon. “There are some counselors who are more sensitive to the disease by allowing more time. Others may have wanted to go faster. It’s true that we walk blind, we move forward as best we can, we discover, we do tests with our policyholders and we see what works.”
The Social Insurance Office does not keep statistics on the success of these rehabilitation measures for long Covid. But according to the AI, the relatively low number of pensions granted suggests that these measures are bearing fruit.
Harald Sohns, his spokesperson, relativizes the weight of the pensions allocated so far for AI. “These costly benefits are marginal for the AI, contrasting with a total of 250,000 pensions that the AI finances each year and which cost around 5.4 billion francs.”
>> Listen to the full interview with Harald Sonhs in La Matinale: Long Covid cases foreshadowed an increase in the number of AI pensions / La Matinale / 1 min. / today at 06:26
Be that as it may, for those concerned, uncertainties persist. What will happen to those who will not regain their full employability? Will they all be entitled to a partial pension? And how will the symptoms evolve and with what effects on their long-term work capacity? So many questions still open when this new disease is no longer in the concerns of the majority of the population.
>> Also listen to the interview of the professor associated with Unisanté Bernard Favrat in Forum: Few people registered with the AI because of Covid long: interview with Bernard Favrat / Forum / 4 min. / today at 19:51
Celine Fontannaz/fgn
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