More depression, more eating disorders: The pandemic has “massive health consequences” for children and young people in Germany.

This is the result of the child and youth report 2022 published by the health insurance company DAK on Friday President of the Professional Association of Paediatricians.

David Lindenfeld

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This is shown by the fact that, according to the DAK, the number of treatments for adolescents with depression and eating disorders in 2021 increased noticeably compared to the previous year.

28 percent more 15- to 17-year-olds with depression and 17 percent more older teenagers with eating disorders came to the clinics.

The situation is similar for emotional disorders: in 2021, the number of 15 to 17-year-olds receiving inpatient care rose by 42 percent.

Emotional disorders include, for example, separation anxiety, social anxiety or phobic disorders such as fear of imaginary figures.

Similar tendencies can be observed among school children between the ages of ten and fourteen.

Here, inpatient treatments for depression (plus 27 percent), anxiety disorders (25) and eating disorders (21) increased.

Girls in particular suffered from the corona burden.

Last year, between the ages of 15 and 17, they were 32 times more likely to be hospitalized than boys with eating disorders.

The proportion of young patients with eating disorders increased by 25 percent compared to the previous year and by 40 percent compared to 2019. In addition, girls came to clinics more often because of depression, anxiety disorders and emotional disorders.

demands on politics

The data also show that primary school children primarily suffer from disorders of social functions, i.e. attachment disorders, and developmental disorders.

In 2021, 36 percent more children between the ages of five and nine were treated in clinics for disorders of social functions.

For developmental disorders, it was an increase of eleven percent.

It is striking that boys were treated more often than girls in this context.

For the period from 2019 to 2021, anonymized accounting data from around 800,000 children and young people aged up to 17 years who are insured with the DAK were examined.

Demands on politicians are linked to the report: “Our current children and youth report shows how much boys and girls are suffering in the pandemic.

The sharp increase in depression or eating disorders is a silent cry for help that must wake us up," says Andreas Storm, CEO of DAK-Gesundheit.

The topic must now be given more weight: "The situation has worsened dramatically in recent years, but politicians have not yet reacted accordingly."

Children and young people are just as vulnerable a group within the population as old or previously ill citizens during the corona pandemic, said Fischbach, President of the Professional Association of Paediatricians.

"While the latter were of course also rightly given attention and care, for more than two years those responsible in politics simply ignored the equally vitally important needs and requirements of the younger generation," criticizes Fischbach.

The damage caused by this is considerable, as this report by the DAK shows - the extent of the permanent damage is difficult to assess today.