• Pandemic Coronavirus: Breaking News
  • Psychology: coronavirus takes its toll on mental health: anxiety and stress increase

Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic in China, much has been said about the psychological consequences of mass confinements. Not only for the fact of spending long quarantines in the confinement of the home or for the feeling of having freedom deprived. Pockets also suffer and the sum of everything can push some people to extreme limits.

A few days ago, in Japan, several local media published concerns about the possible increase in suicides as the pandemic throws more citizens into the economic abyss. All indicators point to a deep recession in the world's most indebted country.

In addition, the health crisis has led organizations such as the Inochi No Denwa Federation, which has spent 50 years with dozens of open phone lines to serve people who ask for help with suicidal thoughts, to have to do without a quarter of their 6,000 members to answer calls.

However, the news that reaches us about the suicide rate in April is that they fell 20% compared to the same period last year, as reported by The Guardian . The reason: " Many people, at home and with their families, feel safe. The stress of work is eliminated, everything is much calmer", explains Yukio Saito, former head of the telephone advice service of the Japanese Federation of Inochi- no-Denwa.

This is good news, although experts believe it may be a temporary situation because the suicide storm may come with the economic crisis that will come after a pandemic that has left 16,103 infected and 696 deaths in Japan. If this happens, the downward trend from last year would be broken. In 2019, the number of registered suicides in Japan was 19,959, falling for the tenth consecutive year. It is the lowest figure since these data began to be recorded in 1978. Specialists pointed out that this trend is due to the increase in psychological services and 24-hour helplines.

However, despite the decline, Japan still has a problem with young people taking their own lives , where the trend is reversed. Throughout 2019, 659 Japanese people under the age of 20 committed suicide, an increase of 60% over the previous year. Japan's highest recorded number of suicides was 34,427 in 2003, after more than a decade of economic stagnation that had particularly affected business owners.

Today, the UN has released a report on the effects of Covid-19 on mental health . "The coronavirus pandemic could unleash a health crisis causing psychological problems such as bereavement, fear of illness or unemployment, " they say from the agency. Also from the World Health Organization (WHO), the director of the Department of Mental Health and Substance Use, Dévora Kestel, recalled that during the past economic crises "the number of people with mental health problems increased, leading to higher suicide rates. "

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