Jane Dodds, health spokeswoman for the Welsh Liberal Democrats, says we are in need of a more caring society

THE Covid-19 pandemic has caused tremendous upheaval to our way of life, our economy and, as has become increasingly clear – our mental health.

The burden caused by the pandemic has been particularly hard on young people who have had critical moments in their lives interrupted by social isolation for months on end.

However, even before the pandemic we already had an epidemic of poor mental health among young people in Wales. A 2019 study reported that almost one in five young people in Wales reported poor mental health.

A survey by Mind Cymru suggests three-quarters of young people have experienced a worsening of their mental health during the pandemic.

A third of young people who tried to access mental health support were unable to do so.

The latest figures from the Welsh Government show that 60% of those waiting to access Specialist Children and Adolescent Mental Health Services for the first time have been waiting over four weeks.

We absolutely cannot afford to just hope things will get back to normal. Across Wales, we will be bearing the scars and trauma of Covid-19 and the response cannot just be limited to professional mental health services.

We need to create a more caring society to help prevent poor mental health.

During the last government, the Welsh Liberal Democrats ensured that at least £14.4m went towards mental support for young people, but we can and must go further.

Going forward we want to see the creation of a 24/7 mental health care service, to ensure no one is left waiting during a time of crisis. We also want to see mental health given legal parity to physical health.

We wouldn’t find it acceptable to wait eight months to be seen for a broken leg, why should it be acceptable for people to wait so long for help during a mental health crisis? We can’t keep waiting for young people to hit crisis point before they can access support.

As the anti-apartheid activist Oliver Tambo once said “the children of any nation are its future” and here in Wales, we must work together to do better by our young and free them from the burden of poor mental health.