Officials from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development have warned about the mounting mental health problems affecting people during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The organisation in Paris called for a “redoubling of efforts” to integrate mental health, work and education policy.
Cases of anxiety and depression have increased significantly across all OECD countries.
In the UK, anxiety levels more than doubled in 2020, increasing in adults to 50 per cent from 21 per cent in 2019.
In many parts of the world, the largely intangible and hidden manifestations of mental health problems make them hard to quantify and difficult for services to allocate resources.
But the group’s detailed breakdown of costs and policies across several countries makes it clear that beyond the personal toll, the cost of unmet mental health needs to the economy is high, at 4.2 per cent of GDP across the OECD countries.
The analysis shows more than a third of these costs are indirect and associated with work absence and productivity.
Ulrik Vestergaard Knudsen, deputy secretary general of the OECD, told an online event for the report's launch that its timing was “critically important” given how recent data reveals what experts are calling “a tsunami” of mental health issues.
Before the onset of the Covid-19 crisis, an estimated one in two people experienced a mental health condition at some point, with one in five living with illness at any given time.
Mr Knudsen said people with mental health conditions had an annual mortality rate up to four times higher than the general population.
Given the known correlations between financial security, employment status, access to treatment and mental health, populations will continue to struggle long after the physical effects of the coronavirus are contained.
Even before the pandemic, a significant number of claimants for sickness pay suffered from mental health conditions.
The report says nearly 60 per cent of Employment Support Allowance claimants in the UK had a mental or behavioural disorder.
In Sweden, 29 per cent of all sickness compensation was related to a mental health condition.
The OECD’s findings make the correlation between poor mental health and a depressed economy quite clear.
While acknowledging laudable shifts in attitude, particularly over the past decade with a concerted effort to de-stigmatise mental health concerns, Mr Knudsen called for better resourcing to meet the growing “treatment gap”.
The disparity between demand and supply of mental health services is estimated to exceed 50 per cent worldwide.
In OECD countries, more than two thirds of working-age people who wanted mental health care could not obtain it and 20 per cent of those who did complained of poor treatment.
On average, mental health spending in those countries is 7 per cent of health budgets, which Mr Knudsen said had barely changed in the past decade.
Christine Morgan, chief executive of Australia’s National Mental Health Commission, told the panel she wanted her government move from a profit-and-loss approach to mental health spending to a balance sheet method that seeks long-term prevention.
“Mental health and well-being is a right of every individual and I want to see us in a world where we have equity in investment in mental health as well as physical health,’ said Ms Morgan, who is also Australia’s suicide prevention adviser.
In some countries, the initial shock of the pandemic and the build-up of mental health needs led to emergency funding and more accessible treatment options, including digital solutions.
But such measures could be temporary and do not fulfil the overall requirements.
While the end of lockdowns around the world will spark a rise in overall happiness, it would be a costly mistake to think mental health issues will subside.
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Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
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Tearful appearance
Chancellor Rachel Reeves set markets on edge as she appeared visibly distraught in parliament on Wednesday.
Legislative setbacks for the government have blown a new hole in the budgetary calculations at a time when the deficit is stubbornly large and the economy is struggling to grow.
She appeared with Keir Starmer on Thursday and the pair embraced, but he had failed to give her his backing as she cried a day earlier.
A spokesman said her upset demeanour was due to a personal matter.
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What can victims do?
Always use only regulated platforms
Stop all transactions and communication on suspicion
Save all evidence (screenshots, chat logs, transaction IDs)
Report to local authorities
Warn others to prevent further harm
Courtesy: Crystal Intelligence
Opening day UAE Premiership fixtures, Friday, September 22:
- Dubai Sports City Eagles v Dubai Exiles
- Dubai Hurricanes v Abu Dhabi Saracens
- Jebel Ali Dragons v Abu Dhabi Harlequins
