What working a 55-hour week does to your body A landmark global study has revealed the impact of long hours on health – and who is most at risk 19 May 2021 • 12:08pm Are you working from home, or living at work? This was one of the questions raised by many of us as we found ourselves battling longer hours and higher workloads during the shift to working from home in the past year. But just how damaging are long working hours for our health? According to the first global study of its kind, an astonishing 745,000 people died in 2016 from stroke and heart disease due to long working hours.