The safest jobs amid coronavirus outbreak

The recent spate of event postponements and cancellations has drastically changed the landscape of the art industry in the wake of the global coronavirus pandemic.

While artists are expecting a drastic loss in their income, new data collected by the New York Times suggest that there is a silver lining to the solitary nature of their career.

Fine artists, including painters, sculptors and illustrators, have an especially low risk for contracting coronavirus, as they rank zero for potential exposure to disease and infections.

Picture: iStock

They score a modest nine for their degree of physical proximity to others during a typical workday, while writers and authors are at 14 on proximity.

All art-related occupations do not face the same risk of being exposed to coronavirus, as curators score five on exposure and 44 on proximity.

Museum conservators rank zero for exposure like fine artists, but surpass them by 46 points when it comes to proximity to other workers.

Meanwhile, graphic designers are also at a lesser risk of contracting coronavirus, scoring zero for exposure and 34 for proximity.

Picture: iStock

Not surprisingly, nurses, paramedics and dentists account for the professions with the highest risk of being exposed to coronavirus, respectively ranking 80, 89 and 95 for exposure.

The New York Times’ graph was created with data from O*NET, a database maintained by the US Department of Labor that describes various physical aspects of different occupations.

It is worth noting that the database assigns dozens of scores to each occupation for things like how often a telephone is used, and how often a job requires you to engage in any form of physical activity.

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