Mental health problems account for a growing proportion of children’s visits to hospital emergency rooms, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. From March, when the pandemic was declared, to October, the figure was up 31 percent for those 12 to 17 years old and 24 percent for children ages 5 to 11 compared with the same period in 2019.
Others suggest the fallout of the pandemic could reverberate far beyond the time of masks and quarantines.
“Students are struggling across the board,” said Jennifer Rothman, senior manager for youth and young adult services at the nonprofit National Alliance on Mental Illness. “It’s the social isolation, the loneliness, the changes in their routines.”
“Students who might never have had a symptom of a mental health condition before the pandemic now have symptoms,” Rothman said.
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