Statistics about the psychological toll of the pandemic on children are truly alarming. In a recent report, titled, Youth Mental Health Crisis further Exposed By COVID-19 Pandemic, the U.S. Surgeon General says according to early estimates, we lost more than 6,600 young people, 10- to 24- year-olds, to suicide in 2020. That’s roughly 10 times the number of deaths for that age group than can be attributed to COVID-19. It’s hard to imagine the level of despair—feelings of helplessness, isolation, and depression—these deaths must represent among children nation-wide.
So the big questions are these: How much can be attributed to trends that were already here, then made worse by throwing a global pandemic on top of countless other societal factors? And how much can we blame COVID mitigation policies themselves? And most importantly, looking forward, what are the long-term impacts of what’s happened already and can we do better?
To tackle these critical questions, we’re joined by Dr. Mark McDonald, a board certified child and adolescent psychiatrist and author of “United States of Fear: How America Fell Victim to a Mass Delusional Psychosis.”
Watch the full episode on EpochTV.
