Handmade ‘villages’ of spoons that first sprouted on nature strips have brought welcome enjoyment, especially for children, amid the coronavirus
During the first wave of the coronavirus, one could barely walk a block in an Australian suburb without seeing a teddybear peeking through a window.
Aimed at brightening children’s days as the world around them became increasingly gloomy, the uplifting activity slowly died out as the pandemic dragged on.
Continue reading...Data also shows up to 75% of all deaths in care facilities globally were of people with dementia
People with dementia accounted for a quarter of all Covid-related deaths in England and Wales, and three-quarters of all deaths in care facilities globally, data shows.
The London School of Economics and University College London are looking at the mortality rate of those with dementia in a regularly updated report. According to their research, up to 75% of Covid-19 deaths globally in care facilities are those with dementia as an underlying condition.
Continue reading...This common condition can lead to relationship breakdown and unnecessary surgery. So why is treatment still so poor and underfunded?
I was just a few weeks into a new relationship when the pain started. Whenever my boyfriend and I started to have penetrative sex, it felt as if there were razor blades inside me. At first I laughed it off, but soon I became terrified of intercourse. My body would freeze with fear as my clothes came off. By the time we said: “I love you,” even kissing made me feel anxious. I would spend entire day trips and holidays with him worrying about the pain.
When I first went to my GP, the advice I got was to “try and relax”. It was about as helpful as telling someone having a panic attack to “just chill out”. Without a real solution, I started to question whether I was imagining the pain. Or if maybe, somehow, I was to blame for it. My boyfriend was kind and supportive but I felt I was letting him down. Some days, I would feel so ashamed that it was hard to think about anything else. Other days, I’d feel an overwhelming sense of loss for the carefree woman I had been.
Continue reading...The singer and actor on her ‘extremely politically correct’ upbringing, the challenges of parenthood and how lockdown forced her to rewrite her new album
There were choirs planned for Paloma Faith’s new album, a swell of voices to fill out the optimistic, celebratory songs. Then the pandemic struck. The album changed dramatically, in just a few weeks. Some of the more upbeat songs were dropped, she says, because in the midst of so much crisis and loss, “it felt like the lyrics could be perceived as a bit patronising”. New songs spilled out of Faith and the other writers, all four singles written in lockdown, then recorded in a studio set up in her basement. The songs sound more solitary now; more suited to the times.
We speak over Zoom, Faith lying on a bed at home in London. Infinite Things is her fifth album; her first was released in 2009, and all have been hugely successful. There have also been big singles, such as Only Love Can Hurt Like This and Picking Up the Pieces. Her latest album is also her most personal, perhaps as a result of this year’s forced intimacy.
Continue reading...Findings reveal anxiety, inability to concentrate and fears over employment at high levels among young people
Young people have suffered more with mental health issues over the last few months than any other age group, according to a far-reaching study that has scrutinised the effects of the pandemic on the under-25s.
A troubling picture of growing levels of anxiety and an inability to concentrate was reported by those aged between 18 and 24 as part of an extensive survey of more than 6,000 adults carried out by YouGov and designed by the Resolution Foundation, which was subsequently analysed by the independent charity the Health Foundation.
Continue reading...The first step to change is to admit that systemic racism exists. To own it. Only then can we root it out
• Time to reset: more brilliant ideas to remake the world
Ever since I was a boy, it was my dream to become a policeman. Growing up in Toxteth, Liverpool, amid the riots of the 1980s, it must have seemed crazy: black gay scousers from working-class estates didn’t go into the police.
I joined Greater Manchester police three months after 9/11. From training, through to my transfer to the Metropolitan police in London, racism blighted my career. I fell ill with depression, and challenged the police in the courts. The Metropolitan police was found to have harassed, victimised and discriminated against me, because of my sexuality and the colour of my skin. I was then forced out after 11 years’ service.
Continue reading...The overarching project of my life has been making myself safe. But what is the point if everyone else is drowning and burning and starving?
I am descended from people who factor a flat tyre into a drive to the airport. I own a personal, portable water filter, just in case. I am someone who patrols her boundaries. I am a list writer, a timetable checker.
The overarching project of my life has been making myself safe. No alarms; no surprises. It has become legend in my family that, at age 11, I ruined a holiday by demanding we move out of our accommodation at the foot of what everyone told me was a dormant volcano, because I thought it was too dangerous. (The volcano did erupt, on my 35th birthday.)
Continue reading...UCL and Sussex University study finds younger people confined with bigoted relatives the most depressed
The coronavirus lockdown has provoked a mental health crisis among the LGBTQ community, with younger people confined with bigoted relatives the most depressed, researchers found.
A study of LGBTQ people’s experience during the pandemic, by University College London (UCL) and Sussex University, found 69% of respondents suffered depressive symptoms, rising to about 90% of those who had experienced homophobia or transphobia.
Continue reading...With face coverings compulsory in many settings, people unable to comply for health reasons are being challenged and abused
In the past few weeks, Paul Feeley has been abused four times for not wearing a mask on public transport. “I have a disability lanyard, which signifies I have a hidden disability. I tried to show it … And all I got back was a complete torrent of abuse.”
The most recent incident took place just after he first spoke to the Observer on Thursday. The abuse has made Feeley, who suffers from fibromyalgia, borderline personality disorder and panic attacks, feel “extraordinarily angry, anxious and upset”. He is unable to wear a face covering due to his medical conditions, and legally he is exempt – but he is now worried about travelling on buses and trams in his home town of Manchester. “One man said to me, ‘If you can’t wear a mask, you shouldn’t be allowed out.’”
Continue reading...The rapper’s recent string of erratic tweets prompted his wife to comment on his mental health for the first time
Kim Kardashian West has spoken for the first time about her husband Kanye West’s bipolar disorder after he posted and deleted a string of erratic tweets regarding his family life after the launch of his presidential campaign in Charleston, South Carolina, on Monday.
“Those who are close with Kanye know his heart and understand his words sometimes do not align with his intentions,” she wrote on her Instagram Stories.
Continue reading...From anxiety to grief, our charts illustrate five areas of mental strain faced by people across the country
Continue reading...Exclusive: UCL findings shared with the Guardian underline mental health toll of pandemic
A fifth of vulnerable people in Britain thought about self-harming or killing themselves during lockdown, according to research shared with the Guardian, as a series of inquests underline the mental health toll of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Findings from University College London reveal that 8,000 out of 44,000 people surveyed (18%) reported thoughts of self-harm or suicide, and 42% had accessed support services. A further 5% said they had harmed themselves at least once since the start of the UK’s lockdown.
Continue reading...More than 60,000 Nigerians live in Minawao refugee camp in Cameroon after fleeing from Boko Haram. Many have PTSD and other mental health conditions because of what they endured. Here are some of their stories
Continue reading...Front of magazine’s ‘Madness’ issue attacked as attempt to glamorise mental illness
Vogue Portugal has been criticised for insensitive treatment of mental health on one of its latest magazine covers.
The image – one of four covers created for its July/August “Madness” issue – features model Simona Kirchnerova crouched in a bath flanked by two nurses, with one pouring water over her head. The cover has been criticised both for attempting to glamorise mental illness and for the use of the outdated term “madness”.
Continue reading...Therapy is helping some of the thousands forced over the border to Uganda to cope, but funding shortfalls mean resources are becoming scarcer
As darkness fell, Rebecca closed the door to her makeshift home. The day was over.
The 29-year-old, who had been uprooted from South Sudan to a north Ugandan refugee settlement, sat on the bed where her four children slept and, at around 10pm, tried to take her own life. “By then I didn’t care about anything – not myself, not even my kids. The pain was too extreme,” she says. Her children awoke and their cries brought help from neighbours.
Continue reading...Survey shows people want to continue with more fulfilling and family-friendly work environments
Whatever the new normal is post Covid-19, we don’t want it to be anything like the old one. At least, when it comes to earning a living.
Lockdown has given people a chance to sample new ways of balancing their jobs and family lives and they have concluded that something must change. Just 13% want to go back to pre-pandemic ways of working, with most people saying they would prefer to spend a maximum of three days in the office.
Continue reading...Bristol man sees official record of his age as five years older than he says as theft of his identity
A young man who was given permission to stay in the UK after fleeing Gaza has been on hunger strike for more than 90 days in protest at what he sees as the “theft” of his true identity on his official records.
The man, who has learning disabilities and post-traumatic stress disorder, says he was wrongly assessed as being five years older than he is when he arrived in the UK. He regards his date of birth as a crucial part of his identity and a vital link to his late parents.
Continue reading...Duke of Cambridge reveals he is trained volunteer for UK’s Shout text platform
The Duke of Cambridge has been secretly working as a volunteer supporting people contacting a crisis helpline for mental health support, he has revealed.
Unbeknown to those who have accessed the Shout 85258 text-messaging service, Prince William is one of its 2,000 trained volunteers.
Continue reading...Goverment guidance requiring 2.2 million people in at-risk groups to stay indoors is to be relaxed in England from Monday, the communities minister has announced. Robert Jenrick confirmed that people currently shielding will be able to spend time with their households or, if they live alone, with one person from another household. The full guidance will be posted on the gov.uk website. 'Now that we’ve passed the peak, the risk to those shielding is lower,' Jenrick said.
Continue reading...The modernising economy is changing family structures – but can ‘western’ residential homes be accepted culturally?
After breakfast on a Friday morning, a small group of elderly people are engaging in gentle exercises – walking to one end of a walled compound and back. Some of them need the assistance of nurses or walkers, or both, to complete the journey.
“Usually, we do this a couple of times but it is a little bit cold today so we are going just once,” says Henry Ofori Mensah, administrator at Comfort For The Aged, a residential care home in Kasoa, a dormitory town west of Accra, Ghana’s capital.
At the turn of the century, a facility like this would have been hard to imagine in Ghana.