This article originally appeared and was published on AOL.com
Flight attendants have a lot more to deal with than ensuring the safety and comfort of their passengers.
They have to put up with drunk travelers, violent fliers, premature births and falling scorpions. Furthermore, flight attendants must deal with some severe health consequences, according to reports.
A report released by Business Insider in April 2017 ranks flight attendants on its list of the most “unhealthy jobs in America.” The occupation solidified the number 8 spot, sandwiched between anesthesiologists and prosthodontists.
The publication assessed data from the US Department of Labor’s Occupational Information Network, which provides a database of 974 varying occupations. It evaluated 6 different health risk factors such as exposure to contaminants, diseases and infection, radiation and other hazardous conditions, as well as the amount of time spent sitting.
Business Insider found that the top three health risks for flight attendants include exposure to contaminants, exposure to diseases and infections, and exposure to minor burns, cuts, bites and stings. The overall unhealthiness score for flight attendants ranked at 62.3, on a scale from 0 to 100.
“A flight attendant working in close quarters with passengers is more likely to catch an infectious disease than a lawyer working in an office,” explained Andy Kiersz and Rachel Gillet in the study. Other outlets have delved into additional health threats faced by flight attendants, naming risks such as “radiation from space” and “night work” as areas of concern.
“At flight altitudes, the passengers and crew are exposed to higher levels of cosmic radiation than people on the ground. You cannot see or feel cosmic radiation, so you may not know when you were being exposed,” wrote the Center for Disease Control in its review.
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