BERLIN (AP) – Dinner Pollina returned to school in Berlin for the first time this week after two months of closure. The nine-year-old third-year student was delighted to see her classmates and teachers again, but worries about the effect of the coronavirus pandemic on her life.
“I’m not afraid of the coronavirus, I’m afraid that everything will continue like this: that my school will close again, I can’t see my friends and that I can’t go to the movies with my family,” said the girl, typing the medical mask and sighing deeply. “And wearing that mask is even worse when all the shops are closed.”
Psychiatrists, psychologists and paediatricians in Germany have expressed growing alarm that school closures, social restrictions and other precautions increase the fear, disruption and stress of the pandemic among 13.7 million children and adolescents of Germany, raising the prospect of a future mental health crisis.
“We don’t have long-term studies yet, but there is a lot of anecdotal evidence of an increase in hospitalizations and the practices of psychologists overwhelmed by the crisis,” said Julia Asbrand, a professor of child and youth psychology at Humboldt University in Berlin. The Associated Press.
A recent survey by the Medical Center of the University of Hamburg-Eppendorf found that approximately one in three children suffers from pandemic-related anxiety or depression or has psychosomatic symptoms such as headaches or stomach aches. According to the survey, children from poorer and immigrant families are disproportionately affected.
Pollina, who emigrated from Russia with her family in 2019, worries about forgetting much of her German, as she only speaks Russian at home. She is one of 150 young people from disadvantaged families before the pandemic. he regularly spent time after school in a youth support program on the eastern outskirts of the German capital.
Arche (Ark in English) is based in the Hellersdorf district of Berlin, a district of sad concrete buildings built during the former communist regime in East Germany. Some children are still allowed to come in person, but only once every two weeks. The rest of the time, social workers and educators try to keep in touch through video chats while helping their young clients learn at a distance.
“Many have completely retired and no longer want to leave their rooms. They have gained a lot of weight, play online games non-stop and have no more structure in their daily lives, ”said Arche founder Bernd Siggelkow.
The second major blockade in Germany began before Christmas. This week students from the first to three years were allowed to return to classrooms with a limited number of limited classes and lessons. The government hopes to ease new restrictions in the coming weeks and has said reopening all schools is a priority.
However, there is concern that the country is entering a third wave of infections due to more contagious variants of the virus. Virologists have repeatedly said it is still unclear to what extent the virus spreads from children going to school to homes and communities. More than 2 million people have contracted the virus in Germany and nearly 70,000 have died from COVID-19, though only 10 years under the age of 20, according to the country’s disease control center.
Although children do not run the same risk of serious complications of COVID-19 as older adults, they may be more vulnerable to the side effects of the pandemic on mental health, according to experts.
An analysis by German health insurer DAK on juvenile psychological issues confirms first-person observations of Arche staff.
The assessment, obtained by the German news agency dpa, showed that the number of children and adolescents hospitalized for psychiatric treatment in Berlin almost doubled during the first half of 2020, when schools were closed for more than two months during the country’s first closure, compared to the first six months of 2019.
The statistics underscore the psychological stress the pandemic is causing young people, but it does not illustrate the extent of the problem, Christoph Correll, director of child and adolescent psychiatry at Charite Hospital in Berlin, told dpa.
“Hospitalizations are the tip of the iceberg,” he said.
Adolescents, especially girls, are more likely to suffer from eating disorders and self-harm, and the psychological problems of many children are not detected while parents are overwhelmed and teachers, social workers, and pediatricians have no regular contact with students, clients, and patients. , experts warn. .
Psychology professor Asbrand is concerned that the mental health of children and adolescents is not getting enough attention during the pandemic. Along with other professionals in the field, he wrote an open letter to the government this month to push for the needs of young people to be better addressed in the ongoing health crisis and given priority when society reopens.
An immediate action that could be taken by government authorities to help mitigate possible problems would be to allow groups to come together to do school and youth sports, in accordance with hygiene and distancing precautions.
“We all don’t know yet how this will develop in the long run, but now we need to focus on the mental health of young people,” he said.
While attending Arche this week for help with homework assigned online, 16-year-old Robin Reyer said not being able to stay with friends has been one of the hardest parts of the pandemic restrictions.
“I want to celebrate birthdays again, go out to play football with my friends in the park, or meet them at Burger King,” he said as he took a break out of the spring sun.
“Now it only allows me to meet one friend at most,” he said. “That sucks.”