European lawmakers have advanced a plan that could require employers to assess and address workplace factors that contribute to stress, burnout, and other mental health harms.

On September 2, the European Parliament’s Committee on Employment and Social Affairs approved a report on psychosocial risks, stress, and mental health at work. The legislative initiative was approved by 41 votes to 12, with four abstentions.

A central measure would require employers to carry out regular psychosocial risk assessments, including of workloads, working hours, staffing levels, performance systems, and digital connectivity.

The measures would apply across occupations, but they could have particular relevance to healthcare, where excessive workloads, staff shortages, shift work, and workplace violence are persistent concerns.

The report calls for employers not only to identify such risks but also to take action to address them, shifting more responsibility for prevention from individual workers to the organizations employing them.

Psychosocial risks account for approximately 60% of lost working days in the EU, according to the report.

A 2025 World Health Organization/Europe survey found that 1 in 3 doctors and nurses reported symptoms of depression and 1 in 10 experienced passive suicidal thoughts.

What Could Change for Employers?

Milena Popović Samardžić, MD, PhD, president of the Montenegrin Trade Union of Physicians and vice president of the European Confederation of Independent Trade Unions, said legislation cannot solve physician shortages but could address problems within employers’ control, including poor management, performance systems, and working patterns.

She pointed to frequently changing shifts as one example of a potential burnout risk that employers should assess.

Jonathan Lim, MBBS, PhD, clinical senior lecturer and honorary consultant medical oncologist at The Christie NHS Foundation Trust in Manchester, England, is a member of the European Society for Medical Oncology, which tracks the threat of burnout among colleagues. He said workloads in oncology have increased as treatments have become more complex and more patients receive them.

He welcomed the emphasis on prevention.

“This is an opportunity to set some kind of minimum standards in understanding how you manage psychosocial risk at work and therefore prevent burnout rather than having to deal with the consequences of burnout,” he said.

At its most basic, Lim said, that means considering whether there are enough doctors and nurses for the number of patients being treated.

How Far Should New Rules Go?

The main political dispute is not whether psychosocial risks need attention but how far new EU legislation should go.

In the March 25 draft, rapporteur Estelle Ceulemans called on the European Commission to propose a specific binding directive on work-related psychosocial risks, stress, and mental health by the end of 2026.

But ahead of the September 2 vote, lawmakers agreed to softer wording. Instead of explicitly demanding a standalone directive, the amended text calls on the Commission to first assess whether existing EU legislation is adequate and then bring forward a legislative proposal to address any remaining gaps without duplicating existing rules.

That keeps new binding legislation on the table but stops short of insisting that it take the form of a dedicated directive.

Some employer groups have opposed new binding requirements, arguing that they would be overly prescriptive and create a disproportionate administrative burden.

Trade unions take a different view. Klaus Heeger, LLM, secretary general of the European Confederation of Independent Trade Unions, said existing EU occupational safety legislation does not explicitly address psychosocial risks or work-related stress and argued that specific legislation is needed.

Adam Rogalewski, LLM, PhD, a policy officer of health and social services at the European Federation of Public Service Unions, said it is likely that measures will be folded into another piece of legislation, called the Quality Jobs Act, currently being discussed at the EU.

Ceulemans defended the compromise after hundreds of amendments were submitted.

“We received 450 amendments and reached compromises; that’s democracy,” she said. “The important thing is that the text retains its strength and ambition, and it does.”

The September 2 vote does not itself create new obligations for hospitals or other employers. The procedure is formally a request for the European Commission to bring forward a legislative proposal.

The report must first be approved by the full European Parliament. Parliament’s Legislative Observatory currently lists October 5 as the indicative plenary sitting date.

The experts cited in this article had no relevant disclosures.