Hacking. Coughing. Sneezing. Sometimes the workplace sounds less like an office and more like a hospital ward, especially now that we're at the height of cold and flu season。

　　伤风、咳嗽

打喷嚏，有时候你工作的地方听起来更像是一个医院病房，尤其是现在这种流感高发期。

　　If you're not feeling great, do yourself and your coworkers a favor: Call in sick. You'll likely get better faster and save your employer money。

　　如果你感觉不太好，帮自己也帮同事一个忙：请病假吧。你可能会好的更快还能给老板省省钱。

　　Yes, there's a financial price to coming to work ill. It's called presenteeism, and it costs employers $180 billion annually, according to a 2007 study by the Society for Human Resources Management. That's more than employers shell out for employee absenteeism, which costs only $118 billion a year。

　　没错，带病上班是有经济代价的，这叫做假性出席。根据人力资源管理部门在2007年的研究，每年雇主要为假性出席支付1800亿美元的代价，这比雇主为员工缺席支付的1180亿多多了。

　　Sick employees don't just affect their own work; they infect coworkers who then need to take time off themselves. (Or who come in sick and spread the germs further.)

　　生病的员工影响的不只是他们自己的工作，他们还会传染给同事，那么同事就会请假（或者也同样带病上班再传染给别人。）

　　Is It Just Sniffles?

　　只是流鼻涕吗？

　　Most people do get paid time off. Some 57% of all private businesses offer paid sick leave, according to a 2007 report from the Department of Labor. Still, there's a natural worry that if you don't go in, the work won't get done, or it will pile up so high you'll never be able to get through it all. That's especially true these days, when it seems everyone is doing more work with less resources。

　　大部分人是有带薪病假的。根据劳工部在2007年的统计，私营企业中有57%的单位有带薪病假。当然还有一些很自然的担心，就是你不去上班，事情就做不完，或者事情积攒的太多你总也做不完。像现在大家都要用更少的资源做更多的事情的时候，尤其如此。

　　"People don't want to stay home and add to their coworkers' workloads just because they've got the sniffles," says Michael Smith, a physician who is chief medical editor for WebMD.com. "In the end it hurts more then it helps."

　　Michael Smith医师是WebMD.com网站的首席医疗编辑，他说“人们不愿意仅仅因为自己流鼻涕就呆在家里加重同事的负担。事实上他们上班过大于功。”

　　Yes, if it's really nothing more than sniffles, go on in. To be safe, wash your hands more often, don't touch anyone else's phone or keyboard and always cough or sneeze into a tissue。

　　是的，如果真的仅仅是流鼻涕，那就去上班吧。为了安全起见，勤洗手，别碰别人的电话或者键盘，并且咳嗽或者打喷嚏的时候要用卫生纸。

　　Ideally, though, with any true cold, even just a minor one, you should work from home, Smith says. Definitely call in sick, he adds, if you've got a stuffed nose, cough, chest congestion or are throwing up. And never go into the office with a fever。

　　Smith说，理想的情况是，真正感冒的时候，甚至只是一个小小的感冒，你都应该在家办公。他强调说，如果你鼻子不通气、咳嗽、胸闷或者呕吐那就一定要请病假。绝对不要发着烧走进办公室。

　　"If you've got any inkling of being contagious, it's just not fair to go in," says Wendy Nice Barnes, vice president of human resources at ehealthinsurance.com. She says people showing up at work sick are a much bigger concern than people missing work when they're not really ill。

　　ehealthinsurance.com网站的VP Wendy Nice Barnes说，“如果你有传染的迹象，到公司上班对其他人是不公平的”，她说人们带病上班比不生病的时候请病假麻烦更大。