2019 brought us the year of many parliamentary struggles, but amongst all of the Brexit chaos the issue of improving mental health was being actively debated within the houses of Parliament. It was in February 2019 when then Education Secretary Damian Hinds announced an initiative that would focus on the education of children on topics including relationships and sex education in primary schools and secondary schools respectively. A key theme of the connection between physical and mental health was also set to be taught vigorously throughout all levels of education, which is vitally important in today's society as more and more young people are constantly intertwining their online presence with their real lives, and it is becoming increasingly harder to decipher between the two. Studies have found that as many as 50% of mental health problems can be identified by the tender age of 14, and tragically, suicide has been found to be the second leading cause of death among teenage girls and third leading cause of death among teenage boys, all stemming from mental health problems that are left untreated and largely due to the use of social media.
2020 is the year where this new guidance is set to be introduced into the education system, and so with that alongside the fact that Brexit should no longer be the government's priority as the United Kingdom has formally left the European Union, we can only hope that this is the year where finally mental health is not ignored and is treated as seriously as physical health would be, starting with the most vulnerable people in our society.
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