The All-Party Parliamentary Group on a Fit and Healthy Childhood have published a Report, compiled by 41 academics, charity sector experts and children's play specialists titled The COVID generation: A mental health pandemic in the making.
The Report claims that unless the mental health crisis for children and young people, exposed by the pandemic, is addressed urgently by the UK Government, it may become entrenched long after lockdowns end, and will have a lasting, life changing impact on those affected.
Introducing the Report, APPG Chair, Steve McCabe MP said:
"The pandemic has exposed the UK as a patchwork of mental health disparity, with a fluctuating standard of provision, courtesy of factors ranging from individual family circumstance and socioeconomic status to deep-rooted and stubborn funding failings; both at service and research levels – and even dependent upon which UK country you happen to live in!
Unless the Government uses all the information thrown up by the pandemic about the state of children and young people’s mental health and then discerns, learns and acts – we will be walking, ‘eyes wide-shut’ into the type of long-lasting communal health disaster that will not be capable of a fix via ‘two ‘jabs in the arm,’ a mask and a booster."
The Report contained a number of recommendations for policy and prioritisation including:
- Implementing a cross-national mental health strategy that incorporates the best initiatives from each of the devolved nations, creating a collegiate approach and ensuring access to care and services is consistent across the UK.
- This would need to include a joint Policy statement by the four Children's commissioners.
- Additionally, sectors such as public health, third sector organisations and education services need to work together for a holistic approach.
- New and substantial Government funding, ring-fenced for children and young people’s mental health; marrying resourcing with need and levelling up historic under-funding
- A radical expansion of mental health research, supported by the government, to help identify and support vulnerable people, develop new interventions, treatments and coping mechanisms.
- This would require improved access to regularly collected data for researchers, especially the high quality data already collected on children and young people which is not currently accessible. (For an example of how MQ is already supporting work in this field see the Adolescent Data Platform)
- Effective economic support for disadvantaged families to include a Strategic Review of benefit systems and school meal provision as a recognised vital component in children's mental health and well being.
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- Future policies related to the current pandemic must take into account children and young people with special needs or who are otherwise vulnerable.
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The Report was sponsored by MQ Mental Health research. MQ's CEO Lea Milligan added:
"The most vulnerable in our society are the ones who will be carrying the heaviest burden post-pandemic. The increase in mental illness in the UK was already an alarming trend before COVID struck. Now it is an emergency.
The Government has a ‘once in a lifetime’ opportunity. By implementing this Report’s recommendations, they can help create a resilient generation, able to cope with the uncertainties of the future. Without action, many of our children could face a lifetime of depression, anxiety and other mental illnesses.
Our response to this crisis our children face must be proportional; we must work together, across all nations in the UK and across sectors. Most importantly, we must invest.
It is vital that we get our response right to protect our children’s futures. It is up to us to give the COVID generation a voice."
