Illustration of a young child. – Amber stevens
A package of 10 sessions reimbursed at 100% with a psychologist for children and adolescents whose mental health is affected by the Covid-19 crisis will be set up, announced President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday, traveling to Reims (Marne ).
“Today we have a health problem that affects our children and adolescents, which is added to the epidemic”, declared the Head of State during a meeting with caregivers in the child psychiatry service at the CHU from Reims. The Minister of Health Olivier Véran and the Secretary of State in charge of children, Adrien Taquet, were present alongside the president.
The shrink package will be activated throughout the crisis, with partner psychologists identifiable on a platform and as part of a treatment path through any doctor, who will prescribe this emergency package.
A rise in anxiety and anxieties among the youngest
During his visit, Emmanuel Macron spoke for more than three hours with caregivers and patients, including a teenage girl hospitalized for depression.
“What do you dread the most?” He asks her. “New confinement” due to Covid-19, she replies. “We are doing everything to” avoid it, tries to reassure her the Head of State. “Yes, I would like to go out, see my friends, because staying locked up at home is not easy at all”, testifies the young girl.
“We see something rising that we had not known at the first confinement, anxiety and anxieties in the youngest which were reflected in the figures,” said Emmanuel Macron, who cited a 40% increase in pediatric emergencies since the start of the epidemic.
Endless waits
Four in ten parents said they had observed signs of distress in their child during the first confinement, due in particular to the constraint of confinement and the lack of social relations linked to the closure of schools.
Faced with this demand, the child psychiatry services, long lacking in staff, are overwhelmed. “It would be necessary to double or even triple the number of caregivers”, alerted the head of the child psychiatry service, Anne-Catherine Rolland. She told the Chair that requests for consultations had doubled since September. It now takes eight months to wait for an appointment in Reims, which has only two city child psychiatrists.
Mental health conference planned for this summer
Beyond the emergency package, Emmanuel Macron has promised that more structural responses will be debated during the Assises de la santé mine planned this summer. The lack of attractiveness of the profession of child psychiatrist will thus be addressed.
According to surveys conducted by Public Health France over the past year, the proportion of French people reporting anxiety or depression has increased sharply since the first confinement and has remained at a high level since, affecting nearly a third (31%) of the population. population.
The government launched at the beginning of April a general public campaign to encourage the French to “speak” about their psychological state and to recall the existence of assistance by telephone and Internet, too little known.
The head of state has also decided to grant “psy checks” to students. The psychological impact of confinements on young people is one of the elements that pushed the Head of State to confine as late as possible during the resurgence of the contagion in February and March.