The onset of COVID-19 public health restrictions led to a surge in teens hospitalized for psychiatric issues, with girls experiencing the worst spikes in emotional breakdowns, a study has found.
An international consortium of 27 researchers published the study Tuesday in JAMA Network Open after analyzing data from eight American and French children’s hospitals from Feb. 1, 2019, to April 30, 2021.
They found that the number of youths ages 11 to 17 hospitalized for severe anxiety, depression and suicide risk rose 14% from 9,696 in the 14 months through March 2020 to 11,101 in the subsequent 13 months.
Over the same two periods, the percentage of teens and tweens receiving inpatient psychiatric care jumped from 33.6% to 36.4% of all hospitalizations in the age group.
“These findings support the need for greater resources within children’s hospitals to care for teens with mental health conditions during the pandemic and beyond,” the researchers wrote.
They noted that teen suicide rates have increased since 2010.
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Of all teens hospitalized for psychiatric issues before and after the first COVID-19 quarantines, the share of girls went from 61.5% to 68.5%, the study found.
Psychiatric problems treated in the surge of hospitalizations included self-injury “cutting” attempts, eating disorders, substance abuse and obsessive-compulsive behaviors.
The study did not explain why the gender rift widened while youths stayed home, but girls more often watched video content alone and boys more often played video games online with friends, said Nancy Jennings, director of the Children’s Education and Entertainment Research Lab at the University of Cincinnati.
“For boys, they already had established networks through gaming to maintain connections with peers,” Ms. Jennings said in an email. “Games tend to be engaging and a space for escapism from reality, providing mental health breaks from crisis management. Girls enjoyed connecting with friends online, but some found it less fulfilling than in-person interactions and may have gotten less benefit from their devices than they were hoping for.”
The study echoes a growing number of reports that anxiety, depression and suicide risks soared among teens during pandemic lockdowns of schools and other social outlets.
Surgeon General Vivek Murthy and the American Psychological Association have issued warnings about a lingering youth mental health crisis.
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The study released Tuesday confirms that “a tsunami of mental health challenges has accelerated during the pandemic” among American youths, said clinical psychologist Thomas Plante, an APA member.
“Of course, we still need to be mindful that this study is based on correlation. Cause and effect relationships are complicated and other variables could be involved with the results, e.g., social media influences,” said Mr. Plante, a professor at Santa Clara University. “Nonetheless, we clearly are seeing an increase in mental health problems among youth and this study well demonstrates the crisis we are in.”
Teens have more trouble processing family stress at home and changes to familiar routines because their brains are still developing, said Laura DeCook, the California-based founder of LDC Wellbeing.
“Many adolescents were unable to cope with the social isolation and the ever-changing uncertainty that the pandemic brought to their lives,” said Ms. DeCook, who leads mental health workshops for families. “They lack the same type of resilience and coping mechanisms that adults have developed.”
Officials must be more careful in the future about public health restrictions that inflict lasting harm on children, said some medical professionals responding to the study.
“Social distancing prevented the social engagement many youths need at these moments in order to mitigate mental health challenges and concerns,” said Dr. Panagis Galiatsatos, a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. “In the future, an understanding of the consequences of public health efforts is warranted to mitigate unintended consequences.”
The best way to mitigate such harms is to prepare better for pandemics, said Dr. Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease specialist and a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security.
“It is important to understand that the lack of pandemic preparedness, which prompted more blunt mitigation measures, has had a cascading impact on health that extends beyond COVID,” Dr. Adalja said.
For more information, visit The Washington Times COVID-19 resource page.
• Sean Salai can be reached at ssalai@washingtontimes.com.
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