Barely a week goes by without children’s mental health making headlines, or a study warning us that the nation’s children are worryingly unhealthy. The latest statistics are alarming, with the number of under-18s admitted to acute hospital wards in England due to serious concerns over their mental health increasing by 65% in a decade.
“We are seeing profound mental illness stemming from excessive social media use, online bullying and screen addiction,” child psychiatrist Dr Emily Sehmer wrote in the Guardian in January. “Children are disappearing into online worlds, unable to sleep, increasingly inattentive and impulsive, emotionally dysregulated and aggressive.”
