Ministers ‘ignored warning suicides would kill extra children than Covid’

UK Government Ministers ignored warnings that suicides would kill “many more” youngsters than Covid would, the previous youngsters’s commissioner for England has stated.

Campaigners say the dire warning was amongst 9 alternatives to avert the harm brought on by faculty closures through the pandemic that the Government missed. It got here in a joint briefing paper by the Department for Education and the Independent Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Behaviours.

Official figures present that suicide killed practically 5 occasions extra youngsters than Covid did in 2020. And SAGE scientists warned that closing faculties through the pandemic would doubtless have a “highly limited” affect on Covid transmission charges.

The November 2020 briefing cited proof of an increase in self-harm amongst younger folks throughout lockdown – and said “many more children will die from suicide than Covid-19 this year”. It additionally stated that 12 of the 25 instances of suicide by under-18s recognized through the earlier lockdown in England had Covid-related points – together with faculty issues – as a contributory issue.

The warning was shared with key figures and decision-makers in November 2020 at a Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) assembly. Senior scientific advisers accountable for briefing ministers – and no less than ten senior officers from the Department for Education, the Cabinet Office, the Home Office and different departments – have been on the SAGE assembly.

In England in 2020, there have been 34 deaths from Covid in younger folks aged 10-19 died. However, the identical age group noticed 161 folks take their very own lives throughout the identical interval.

SAGE papers from 2020 additionally confirmed that scientists believed that the affect faculty closures would have on slowing the unfold of covid can be “highly limited.” Nonetheless, ministers ordered that faculties should be closed for many pupils for almost all of the spring time period in 2021.

Parents’ marketing campaign group UsForThem, which needed faculties to stay open through the pandemic, has highlighted the suicide warnings being ignored within the first of a collection of stories. The group is urging the continued Covid Inquiry to contemplate its proof.

Former youngsters’s commissioner for England Anne Longfield advised The Telegraph: “Despite many warnings and protestations to the contrary, the interests of children were overlooked on an industrial scale by government throughout the covid crisis meaning that schools stayed closed for too long, safeguards for vulnerable children were weakened and the impact of isolation and withdrawal of support for children’s mental health were too often ignored.”

Longfield, present chair of the Commission on Young Lives, added: “The consequences of these decisions are seen in a generation of children, many of whom are struggling with their education and social skills, sometimes with levels of chronic anxiety so severe that they are unable to attend school or socialise with friends.”

A DfE spokesman said: “We know children were amongst those most affected by the pandemic which is why we have invested £5 billion in ambitious education recovery initiatives to help young people catch up. We are also rolling out Mental Health Support teams in schools which comes on top of our annual £2.3 billion investment into mental health services.

“The UK Covid-19 Inquiry is at present inspecting the nation’s response to the pandemic, and the division is cooperating totally.”

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If you need a response immediately, it’s best to call them on the phone. You can reach them by calling 116 123, by emailing jo@samaritans.org or by visiting www.samaritans.org.