Urgent referrals of children in mental health crisis in England rise 13% in year
Share:
Charity says NHS failure to help more young people sooner is a ‘shocking betrayal’. The number of children referred to emergency mental healthcare in England has risen by 10% in a year, with lengthy waiting lists for regular NHS care pushing more to crisis point.
There were 34,793 emergency, very urgent or urgent referrals to child and adolescent mental health services crisis teams between April and October 2024, analysis of official data by the mental health charity YoungMinds found. That compared with 31,749 in the same six-month period in 2023.
Many of the children requiring emergency care – some of them suicidal or seriously ill as a result of eating disorders – have been stuck on NHS waiting lists for months or, in the worst cases, several years. The chief executive of YoungMinds, Laura Bunt, said the figures were concerning and showed that thousands of children urgently required help earlier to prevent them from becoming seriously unwell.
“Early support would help prevent many young people from becoming more unwell, but instead their mental health is deteriorating, pushing them into crisis and in some instances putting young people’s lives at risk,” she said. “This is a shocking betrayal of young people and their mental health.”.
She said tweaks to the system would no longer be sufficient to tackle the crisis. “We need major reforms that address the root causes of why so many young people are struggling. It must also be easier for young people to get help for their mental health when they need it. To make this happen, the government must urgently fulfil its promise to roll out early support hubs in every community.”.
