Some Facts About Stress & Mental Health

It is often difficult for employers to grasp the scale of the global epidemic of stress related ill health.

 

The scariest thing about these statistics is perhaps that

- all of them seem to be on the increase

- that is all are getting worse.

 

In the UK:
> 5 million working days are lost each year. That is equivalent to 14,000 people off work all year.
> 1 in 4 suffer depression at some point in their/our lives.
> 12 million people are on anti-depressants (20%)
> More die of suicide than die in road accidents.
> There is one case of self harm every 3 minutes.
> One in ten teenagers suffer depression.
> Around 1 in 50 people suffer from bipolar disorder. At least one in four of them attempt suicide, with some estimates as high as 50%.
www.changeourminds.com/facts.html

 

In Scotland:
> 25% of population will suffer from a mental illness. www.scottishrecovery.net/content/default.asp (This has now become true for the rest of the UK.)
> More than 2 people per day die from suicide. www.chooselife.net/web/site/home/home.asp

In the USA:
> 2.3 million Americans presently affected by the bipolar disorder. (This can only be a rough estimate as most people either do not know what is wrong with them or do not wish to tell anyone about it.)
> 79% of persons with bipolar disorder fear repercussions if they discuss their illness at work.
> Some experts say this psychiatric condition affects about one in every 25 Americans (about 12 million).
> Employers are not legally obliged to give paid holiday and so many Americans do not take holiday. (Could this be contributing to a build up of stress and high levels of mental ill health?)

In Australia: "Almost five per cent of Australians have bipolar 2, experiencing dramatic swings from highs to depression but not psychotic episodes." www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,19984755-1702,00.html

Worldwide:

> British Telecom report that on a typical day 500 of their 104,000 staff are off sick with mental illness. This is the only one of the stats on this page to be going down (from 700 per day a few years ago). This is due to BT's stress reducing initiatives. BT are confident further improvements can be made. BT 10/10/06

 

This is just a quick snap shot of the sort of facts and figures around these days about some mental health issues.

Of course stress is just as much responsible for physical health issues.

 

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