Shortchanging the next generation’s mental health is a false economy the country can ill afford

Analysis: A deluge of reports have laid bare the scale of the mental health crisis in England but Alex Matthews-King says it is all too easy to lose sight of the real cost if we leave children to suffer unsupported

Behavioural and emotional disorders like depression and ADHD affect around four children in every English classroom (Getty/iStock)

In the most in-depth stock take of young people’s wellbeing for more than a decade, an NHS report found one in eight children have a mental health disorder and numbers are rising.

The findings throw into stark relief the challenges that must still be overcome, despite rising public and political awareness.

Just hours earlier the children’s commissioner for England, Anne Longfield, warned in her own review of a “vast gap” between what NHS services are providing and what is needed.