‘Second pandemic’ could be mental health fallout as effects of Covid-19 are felt globally

The first global data on the impact of Covid-19 on mental health have been released, and the numbers are staggering.

Of 130 countries surveyed, 93% have seen “disrupted or halted critical mental services”, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO), which carried out the survey.

This comes at a time when the need for such services is on the increase as populations battle anxiety, financial losses, bereavement and depression.

“Many people may be facing increased levels of alcohol and drug use and insomnia,” according to WHO, which adds that even before the pandemic struck, countries were spending on average less than 2% of their national health budgets on mental health.

Sectors within mental health services most badly hit were services for children and adolescents (72% halted or disrupted), the elderly (70% halted or disrupted) and antenatal and postnatal mental health services (61% halted or disrupted).

School and workplace mental health services also saw disruptions upwards of 75%, while almost a third of access to medications for mental, neurological and substance use disorders was lost.

According to Prof Hlonipha Mokoena from the Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research, the world is likely to see a “second pandemic” in the form of mental health fallouts in the wake of the Covid-19 during 2020.

“The pandemic has introduced a whole new set of inequalities to do with mental health issues, and I don’t think anyone was prepared for that. We are looking at a second pandemic,” she said.

“The impact on people’s psychological wellbeing might be a new fault line, and it is not one we could have imagined.”

She said it wasn’t as simple as those with resources being fine and those without struggling. Instead, the Covid-19 effect on mental health had struck at all levels of society and affected different individuals in different ways.

Mokoena said: “What is becoming clear is an emerging despair around the globe linked to the seismic event that is Covid-19.”

According to WHO director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus: “Good mental health is absolutely fundamental to overall health and wellbeing. Covid-19 has interrupted essential mental health services around the world just when they’re needed most. World leaders must move fast and decisively to invest more in life-saving mental health programmes during the pandemic and beyond.”

According to WHO research before the pandemic, every dollar invested in mental health represents a five dollar gain in productivity.

This is significant in light of the fact that even before the pandemic, nearly $1-trillion in economic productivity is lost annually from depression and anxiety alone.

TimesLIVE