A report by the government’s Horizon Scanning Team – a group of senior civil servants who meet to identify future trends – found that traditional “risky behaviours” by young people, such as drinking, smoking, taking drugs and criminal behaviour, are on the decline.
But it has identified self-harm, as well as social isolation, loneliness, anxiety and body appearance issues, as growing potential threats.
The report states that there is a shortage of reliable data on the extent of self-harm by adolescents, largely because it is an issue that “many people will keep hidden and not seek help for”.
It references a 2002 survey by the British Medical Journal in which 6.9 per cent of 15- and 16-year-olds reported that they had self-harmed, and a 2013/14 World Health Organisation survey in which 20 per cent of 15-year-olds taking part reported having self-harmed, as an indication the issue may be getting worse.
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