The expert that more young people get sick from stress: We can reverse the trend

Linnea Palmqvist had a back shot at age 23, recurring colds and had difficulty sleeping. She then studied as an architect at the college and her boyfriend saw how she ended up prioritizing her health and piece by piece was broken down.

Today, she looks back on the time when she was feeling bad because of the stress and performance demands - and thinks it is time to look at stress disorder in a different way.

- We have to make society realize that it is not the fault of the individuals, when there are so many people who get sick every year. That there will be more and more. What is it?

Never before have so many Swedes been on sick leave due to mental illness. And the biggest reason for that is stress.

- The increase is an effect of socially triggered problems. It is really quite small things that are necessary for us to overcome this, says Kerstin Evelius, the government's previous coordinator for mental health.

Several experts with Assignment Review have spoken that society does not need to create more care places for patients who are sick from stress, but instead needs to direct efforts where they do benefit. Before people get sick.

- There are too few promotional efforts. How do we help young people cope with the stress that exists? What expectations do they have of themselves, or do they think others have them? We adults need to be present and have a constant dialogue, says Kerstin Evelius and continues:

- Then we also have a professional life that causes problems, where you usually make entrance and career when you have children.

In the recent sharp rise in stress-related ill health, there is something that both nurses and researchers worry about. Young people are becoming more and more. And most are women. Among women between the ages of 25 and 29, the number of people sick due to stress diagnoses has increased by 370 percent since 2011.

The percentage increase is greatest among the younger ones, even though the largest group of sick leave is women between 45 and 49 years.

- We have to stop treating the risks in working life as if it were in 1972. It's not about office chairs anymore. We need to look at our organizational culture and see that people should be sustainable over an entire working life. Employees, employers and trade unions must rethink. Everyone cannot perform at a maximum level evenly, and we must allow it to be so, says Kerstin Evelius.

Assignment review has followed four young women for some crucial months in their lives - you will find the series “Sick Stressed” on SVT Play.