New study shows how children’s mental health has suffered from pandemic

Anyone who has cared for or spent time with a child in the past 18 months knows how emotionally difficult the COVID-19 pandemic has been for them.

Now, one of the largest studies on children’s mental health during the pandemic to date shows just how important the toll has been, indicating that one in four young people worldwide are struggling with clinically elevated symptoms of depression, and that 1 in 5 has increased signs of anxiety.

These numbers suggest that depression and anxiety essentially doubled in children around the world during the pandemic, the researchers said.

“When COVID-19 started, most people thought it would be difficult at first, but the children would improve over time as they adjusted and returned to school,” Sheri Madigan, author of the study published in JAMA Pediatrics Monday and a clinical psychologist from the University of Calgary said in a statement. “But when the pandemic persisted, young people missed many milestones in their lives. It went on for over a year, and for the young people it is a really important time in their lives.

The researchers pooled data from more than 29 studies involving more than 80,000 children in Asia, Europe, North America, Central America, South America and the Middle East.

The analysis suggests that older teens and girls experienced the highest rates of depression and anxiety during COVID-19 – confirming what many experts have been saying for months.

In a poll conducted in the United States this spring, for example, parents of teenage girls said they were particularly worried about the emotional impact the pandemic had on them, noting that they faced sleep disturbances and were withdrawing from family life. In another survey carried out a few months after the start of the pandemic, 70% of teens said they had mental health issues in one way or another.

There are reasons why teens may be especially susceptible to depression and anxiety right now. As an expert told HuffPost at the start of the pandemic, a teen’s “job” is to become more independent and step out into the world, but they couldn’t do it.

“Once you enter your teenage years, you start to differentiate yourself from your family members and your peers can actually become your most important source of social support,” said Nicole Racine, clinical psychologist at the University of Calgary and lead researcher on the new article, in a statement. declaration. “This support was drastically reduced, and in some cases completely absent, during the pandemic. “

Racine and his co-researchers noted that rates of depression and anxiety have tended to fluctuate with COVID-19 restrictions – increasing when children and teens are kept home and away from their peers and typical routines. .

This suggests that many children could essentially bounce back when the pandemic recedes. However, in the United States and some other countries, cases are increasing again with the highly contagious delta variant, and the next school year will by no means be a typical year.

Yet groups like the American Academy of Pediatrics have strongly urged schools to resume in-person learning this fall, in large part because of the impact of the past 18 months on children’s mental health, and called on pediatricians and schools to screen children. (and their parents) for mental health issues this year and beyond.

Experts have also emphasized throughout the pandemic that there are steps parents can take to help with a multi-pronged approach needed to support children’s mental health. To get started, just validate how difficult the pandemic has been and make it clear that you are available to talk. Also be on the lookout for “re-emergence anxiety”. (Here are four questions parents can ask that can be helpful in assessing how children are doing.)

“I think for most of the kids who have had high mental health symptoms, some of them will resolve themselves,” Racine said. “But there will be a group of kids who don’t. For them, this pandemic may have been a catalyst, putting them on a path that could be difficult. And there’s another group of kids who had mental health issues before the pandemic. They could really struggle in the long run.