NPR (5/14, Kamenetz) reports, “In response to a call on social media, parents across the country shared with NPR that the mental health of their young children appears to be suffering as the weeks of lockdown drag on.” According to Dr. Dimitri Christakis, director of the Center for Child Health, Behavior and Development at Seattle Children’s Hospital, and the editor-in-chief of the journal JAMA Pediatrics, the problem “isn’t just learning loss.” Christakis says a new study published in JAMA Pediatrics “documents elevated depression and anxiety among children under lockdown in China.” Christakis wrote an editorial, also published in JAMA Pediatrics, arguing “that the risks to children’s learning, social-emotional development and mental health need to be better balanced with the risks of spreading the coronavirus.”
Related Links:
— “With School Buildings Closed, Children’s Mental Health Is Suffering, “Anya Kamenetz, NPR, May 14, 2020