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Sickness benefit
Publication: 10/12/2020 Last update: 17/05/2023
If you are a private sector worker and are temporarily unfit for work due to illness, you are entitled to a specific social security benefit to compensate for the loss of your employment income.
You will be granted this right if you belong to one of the following categories of workers according to the specific legislative framework:
- industrial, service and agricultural workers;
- apprentices;
- unemployed persons;
- workers suspended from work;
- workers in the entertainment arts;
- seafaring workers;
- workers registered in the separately managed scheme (referred to in Article 2(26) of Law No 335/95);
- others.
To apply for the benefit, you must ensure that a medical certificate is submitted via the online sickness benefit channel of the central reception system (SAC) for use by the treating doctor, or you can send a paper medical certificate directly to the National Social Security Institute (INPS) and your employer.
Please consult the following chapters of the Mutual Information System on Social Protection (MISSOC) to find out under what circumstances and how you can apply, what you are entitled to and who you can contact.
NB: updates for 2020 are being published by the MISSOC Secretariat.
Applicable statutory basis
- Law No. 138/1943, on sickness
- Law No. 33/1980, on sickness
- Law No. 638 of 11 November 1983, on sickness
- Law No. 488/1999, on sickness benefits
- Law No. 296 of 27 December 2006, on sickness
- Law No. 241 of 23 December 2011, on sickness
- Law No. 128 of 2 November 2019, on sickness
