Doctors: Floods, climate disasters harm kids’ mental health

Doctors for the Environment Australia

The catastrophic floods in Queensland and New South Wales are having severe mental health and well-being impacts on children, according to health experts in flood affected areas.

Sydney-based child and adolescent psychiatrist and a member of Doctors for the Environment Australia Dr Cybele Dey said there is now strong evidence that climate change-driven extreme weather disasters are associated with increased mental distress, mental health hospitalisations, suicide attempts and tragically, deaths from suicide.

“Being faced with harrowing images of people and animals drowning in the flood waters and homes floating downstream is difficult for children to process and threatens their well-being,” Dr Dey said.

“The effects on our mental health also seem to be worse when people cannot get relief from the weather”.

Dr Dey said impacts of these floods are on top of the worry many children and young people feel about climate change and what science tells us may unfold in their lifetimes without urgent, global action.

“Australian research showed that even in the midst of a lockdown, these very real threats worried young people more than Covid,” Dr Dey said.

Children born today are likely to face seven times more extreme weather events than their grandparents”.

And Lennox Head GP and a member of Doctors for the Environment Australia Dr Dan Ewald said people were dealing with mental health issues due to displacement and unfamiliar surroundings in the evacuation centres, and infections from the floodwaters.

“Ballina Hospital shut down and was moved to the High School for a few days, but is back now in the original building,” Dr Ewald said.

“All these situations are complicating health management for staff”.

Dr Dey said Australia can and must reduce fossil fuel use and exports this decade to mitigate the worst effects of climate change.

“The importance of taking this opportunity to protect health cannot be overstated, it’s essential to protect our children’s mental health now and in the future,” she said.

/Public Release.