Opinion: Mental health is a care we must share

Professor Peter Fonagy, Head of UCL Psychology & Language Sciences, writes about how wide social networks can help to shield people from mental disorder, arguing that we should celebrate this collective responsibility. The government published its first national review of children and young people's mental wellbeing on 10 October, World Mental Health Day. The report found that four out of five children are happy with their lives. Or, more worryingly, that one in five are not. But what lies behind these figures' Between 2012 and 2018, the number of children and young people referred for mental health treatment increased by about two-thirds. The number of university students reporting a mental health problem rose fivefold over the same period. How can we understand these dramatic increases' Has there been an actual rise in mental disorder? In fact, reports of a rise in mental health problems are for the most part exaggerated: the prevalence of mental disorder in fiveto 15-year-olds has increased, but only by 16% in the past 20 years, although the increase for emotional disorders for young women aged 16-24 is far higher.