Employees Forced to Work for Two Hours Beside Their Colleague’s Corpse

Last June in Madrid, a 56-year-old telesales veteran collapsed from a sudden heart attack at her desk. Paramedics arrived promptly, but despite their best efforts, she was pronounced dead on-site.

Shockingly, her teammates—stunned and grieving—were ordered to carry on processing calls for a full two hours while her body remained at the workstation¹. A union safety delegate later confirmed that no evacuation notice was ever issued, leaving staff to endure the morning’s trauma in an atmosphere of profound distress.

Did you know? Exposure to traumatic events at work, such as witnessing a colleague’s death, increases the risk of long-term mental health issues by up to 30%³.

Calls for Accountability

By mid-afternoon, only after persistent pressure, did management finally clear the office—followed by funeral services an hour later. Throughout, the presence of police officers did little to comfort employees who felt their employer prioritized business continuity over basic compassion. Unions and witnesses have denounced this handling as a flagrant breach of the EU’s Workplace Safety Framework², demanding clear protocols to protect workers from such insensitive ordeals in the future. With grief still raw, these employees hope their painful experience sparks meaningful change in workplace emergency policies.

Footnotes

1. Work Safe UK, “Health and Safety at Work: Emergency Medical Responses,”; https://www.worksafe.uk.com/health-and-safety/emergency-response-planning-for-health-and-safety-managers/

2. European Agency for Safety and Health at Work, “Framework Directive 89/391/EEC on Safety and Health at Work”; https://osha.europa.eu/en/legislation/directives/framework-directive

3. World Health Organization, “Mental Health in the Workplace,” 2022; https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/mental-disorders