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Covid-19 Highlights Need For Good Mental Health Resilience

This year’s World Mental Health Day (Saturday 10th October) comes as the coronavirus pandemic strains our lives in ways that would have seemed impossible a year ago.

To recognise this, and support this year’s theme of good mental health for all, the charity Mental Health Foundation have publishing new findings from their ongoing Coronavirus: Mental Health in the Pandemic study, carried out in partnership with the universities of Cambridge, Swansea, Strathclyde and Queen’s Belfast.

Their latest findings look at the ways we can protect our mental health and prevent mental health problems developing, or worsening. In particular, we report on the activities identified by adults in the UK as helping them to cope with the stress of the pandemic.

According to their research, the most popular coping activities include going out for a walk, visiting a park or other ‘green’ space, contacting family or friends (for instance by phone or video chat), maintaining a healthy lifestyle (enough sleep, exercise and a balanced diet, for instance) and doing a hobby.

Mental Health Foundation are calling on the UK government and devolved governments to produce a whole-government mental health response and recovery plan that will support individuals’ resilience and ability to cope with to the mental health effects of the coronavirus pandemic today and tomorrow.

You can download the report from the Unionsafety E-Library or by clicking o the cover photo on the right. The E-Library contains resources and reports on understanding and coping with mental health illness and these can be found using search category 'Mental Health'.

One way you can support the Mental Health Foundation's work is to share the following post on your social media, tell your friends by email, or even on the phone!

‘Walking, spending time in nature and staying in touch with friends and family have been identified by the Mental Health Foundation through their recent research as the most helpful ways to cope with the stress of the pandemic.

Together we call on the governments across the UK to produce a whole-government COVID-19 Mental Health Response and Recovery Plan, to support the nations mental health resilience’

Good mental health for all is a theme not only for World Mental Health Day, but for all of us at all times, and should be a core aim of governments’ responses to the pandemic.

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