Mental health among UK secondary pupils worsened sharply in pandemic, study shows

Even partial school attendance during lockdown put students in a better place to adjust to returning to school full-time than no attendance at all, the study found. Photograph: insta_photos/Alamy

Secondary school pupils in the UK experienced significantly higher rates of depression, social, emotional and behavioural difficulties, and overall worse mental wellbeing during the Covid pandemic, research shows.

Cases of depression among secondary school pupils aged 11 to 13 rose by 8.5% during the pandemic compared with a 0.3% increase for the same cohort prior to Covid, according to a comparative study by researchers at the University of Oxford’s psychiatry department.