"Did you see how fat you are?" The metallic squeaks of the swing are mixed with the mockery of a young boy. "In this summer of 2021, in this small town of Isère, these were just simple words," recalls Nina, 15. But there are words that are more dangerous than beatings. A few days later, she starts skipping most meals. Anorexia then takes control of his life. "I was so tired of being me, that I wanted to no longer exist," says Nina. About thirty times, the teenager tried to end her life. The violence of his story contrasts with his childish features.

Now out of school after several stays in a psychiatric hospital, Nina is on antidepressants. As always more young people, according to figures recently put forward by the High Council for the Family, Childhood and Age (HCFEA): among children, the consumption of so-called psychotropic drugs has doubled in ten years. Among these drugs, antidepressants, whose prescriptions increased by 62% between 2014 and 2021.

"This observation is correct," confirms Thierry Delcourt, child psychiatrist. Like his colleagues, this specialist in childhood disorders tries to prescribe as rarely as possible. But prescriptions for psychotropic drugs are mainly signed by general practitioners. "These are encouraged by the pharmaceutical industry," says the psychiatrist. Big Pharma's watchword is no different from that of other industries, sums up Thierry Delcourt: you have to sell.

Born in the United States, this drift immediately associates the slightest attention disorder or other disruptive behavior with a psychic pathology. And faced with these supposed diseases, a chemical remedy is proposed, explains the psychiatrist.

Thus "uninhibited", the prescriptions of psychotropic drugs can not be apprehended as an indicator of the prevalence of disorders, warns Xavier Briffault, researcher in social sciences and philosophy of health at the CNRS. For him, this is a fallacious causal link, advanced by the proponents of the prescription at all costs: "Children suffer, we prescribe them the remedy." We dramatize and "medicate" even before listening, adds psychiatrist Thierry Delcourt.

But this dramatization does not detract from any reality from the drama, he explains: "I receive between ten and fifteen requests for child psychiatric appointments a day." Overwhelmed, like all his colleagues, this specialist in childhood disorders is only able to answer one or two requests a day.

The stigma of Covid-19

"Worse: for this majority of cases where it is not medically justifiable, the drug reflex will worsen the evil it is supposed to fight," alarmed Thierry Delcourt. On the road to their individual development, children or adolescents can naturally encounter difficulties, and these correspond to stages, explains the doctor. "When a young person is allowed to understand the nature of his anxiety, he overcomes it, because to understand is to heal. By erasing the symptoms of a malaise, psychotropic drugs really help, but never heal," concludes the author of "The Factory of Abnormal Children" (ed. Max Milo).

These individual mental disorders constitute a new societal reality, worries Xavier Briffault. For him, the prevalence of mental disorders among those under 25 observed during the pandemic period is "unprecedented in the history of humanity".

"On March 17, 2020, young people learned on the lips of Emmanuel Macron that their country was 'at war' and that they were going to be confined to their homes until further notice. The irruption of this unthinkable has shaken in them any feeling of predictability," explains the sociologist. Deprived of this stability at a crucial stage of their development, children during the pandemic period could, according to him, retain the stigma for the rest of their lives.

For some young people with mental disorders, the end of confinements initially caused euphoria, notes Valérie Chevalier, workshop instructor in an establishment and service of assistance through work (Ésat) in Paris, where she supervises people with mental and psychological disabilities. But over the months that followed, the "world after" became darker: in 17 years of career, Valérie Chevalier has never seen so many users have to leave the structure to spend time in a psychiatric hospital. Another trend worries him: pathologies as severe as schizophrenia affect adolescents much younger than before. Some are as young as 13.

Verbalization of mental disorders

Her own daughter, aged 19, has seen anxiety invade her life as lockdowns unfold. Last summer, Emmy returned from the baccalaureate exams in tears. Paralyzed by an unspeakable panic, the girl was unable to cross the threshold of the door of the examination room. Suffering like her from anxious school refusals, more and more students can no longer take the path of school, reports Gabrielle Auzias, a young psychologist in middle and primary school. Children would never have dared to lend themselves to such behaviors "in the past", grumble some, among the grandparents' generation. "Perhaps, but verbalization is preferable to neurosis," says child psychiatrist Thierry Delcourt.

This verbalization of mental health problems is symptomatic of our socio-economic model, analyzes Xavier Briffault: the more complex a society becomes, the more relational skills it requires. Clearly, if industrial society was based on the physical strength of workers, tertiarized societies are built around the cognitive abilities of their members. And this concern also finds an economic justification, says the sociologist: mental disorders represent the main expense of health insurance.

In the era of positive psychology, the omnipresence of mental health issues in bookstores as well as on television sets is also explained by an injunction: that of being well. But faced with the challenges of our century, should we not instead consider depression as a form of lucidity? Certainly, answers the researcher: not subservient to the "tyranny of happiness", depressives would make more realistic assessments of the problems we face. It is here that perhaps a glimmer of hope emerges: "Lucidity in the face of the state of the world is a driving force for action."

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