#Chances4Children: 30,000 under-13s access mental health support over text

A new report by Shout 85258, Half a Million Conversations Through a Pandemic: the Power of Text for Providing 24/7 Digital Mental Health Support, states that of more than 213,000 people of all ages across the UK using its flagship digital service, 36,559 conversations took place with texters aged 13 and under. 

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A quarter of people in this age group were most likely to discuss self-harm (24 per cent) while seven per cent wanted to talk about bullying, the charity says.

The report adds that 65 per cent of texters were aged under 25 and 28 per cent are aged under 17.

The research shows that during the first UK lockdown, which began last March, the number of texters Shout 85258 referred to child and adolescent mental health services doubled.

The research comes as the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health warns that mental health will be the biggest health concern affecting young people by 2040.

Young people were reaching out “in anticipation of future events, such as exam results, which as the pandemic hit became more around anxiety in general,” the charity says.

Across all age groups, 80 per cent of Shout texters identified as female and were twice as likely to mention eating disorders and body image than male.

Females also discussed self-harm in nearly a quarter of conversations, the report shows.

Meanwhile, seven per cent of all texters were autistic and 35 per cent were part of the LGBTQ+ community, the report states.

Shout 85258 is the first service from Mental Health Innovations, a charity founded with a grant from The Royal Foundation.

Victoria Hornby, chief executive of Mental Health Innovations said: “When Mental Health Innovations publicly launched Shout 85258 in May 2019, our aim was to bring free digital intervention in the form of text message support to anyone in the UK who is struggling to cope. 

“Since then we’ve swiftly grown to become an essential 24/7 mental health support service, supporting more than 1,000 people every day. We have a community of more than 2,200 volunteers and staff in the UK and New Zealand. This report is a testament to partnership, collaboration and innovation, and the extraordinary, selfless commitment of thousands of volunteers, to whom we are incredibly grateful.”