Pandemic plunges an extra 60,000 adolescents into depression

THE pandemic tipped an additional 60,000 secondary school children in England into clinical depression, a study suggests.

University College London (UCL) found that depressive symptoms such as low mood, loss of pleasure and poor concentration in adolescents increased by 6 per cent after Covid struck, with girls faring worse than boys.

The team said that the depression rate in 11-to-14s had been rising even before the pandemic and a rate of about 25.5 per cent would have been expected. However, it had jumped to 27.1 per cent by spring 2020 – a relative increase of 6 per cent. “Even before the Covid-19 pandemic, there had been widespread concern about rising mental health difficulties among adolescents,” said Dr Praveetha Patalay, of UCL’S Centre for Longitudinal Studies.

“Here, we have found the pandemic contributed to a small additional rise in mental health difficulties among adolescents in England. As the pandemic is ongoing and many of its negative impacts may be long-lasting, there is a need to prioritise young people and resource sufficient support for their mental health and wellbeing.”

The study, published in Royal Society Open Science, compared two groups of adolescents – a total of 11,450 secondary school pupils – over two separate 18-month periods just before, and during the pandemic

The first cohort was measured from late 2018 to early 2020, while the second group was tracked from autumn 2019 to February and April 2021. In both groups, depressive symptoms increased across the study period but there was a greater uplift for those who were exposed to the pandemic.

It comes as the Children’s Commissioner leads a six-month independent review for the Government on families, to ask children, parents, grandparents, and professionals what they think of family, how they see it and what they think of services.