'It felt like my insides were crying': China COVID curbs hit youth
mental health
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[August 30, 2022]
By Farah Master and Xiaoyu Yin
HONG KONG Reuters) - Zhang Meng had a
breakdown last December. The 20-year-old found herself sobbing on the
stairs of her dorm, driven to despair by repeated COVID lockdowns of her
university campus in Beijing.
The lockdowns had meant she was mostly confined to her room and unable
to meet up with friends. There were also strict curbs on when she could
visit the canteen or take a shower. Describing herself as someone who
craves in-person social interaction, Zhang said the restrictions had
"removed the safety net that was holding me up and I felt like my whole
being was falling down".
That month, she was diagnosed with major depression and anxiety.
Yao, also 20 and who asked that his first name not be used, had his
first breakdown in high school where he was a boarder, unable to
understand why lockdown policies were so tough. He said that one day he
had to take refuge in a school toilet, crying so hard "it felt like my
insides were crying."
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In early 2021 while at university in Beijing, unable to shake that
depression and also unhappy he had not taken the courses he wanted to
for fear of upsetting his father, Yao attempted suicide.
China has employed some of the world's harshest and most frequent
lockdown measures in its determination to stamp out every COVID
outbreak, arguing it saves lives and pointing to its low pandemic death
toll of around 5,200 to date.
It's an effort it has shown little sign of abandoning, but the policy's
impact on mental health alarms medical experts and as Zhang's and Yao's
experiences have shown, it is already taking its toll.
"China's lockdowns have had a huge human cost with the shadow of
mental-ill health adversely affecting China’s culture and economy for
years to come," argues a June editorial in the British medical journal
the Lancet.
In particular, experts fear for the mental health of teenagers and young
adults, more vulnerable because of their age and lack of control over
their lives, and who have to contend with far greater education stresses
and economic pressures than earlier generations.
The number of young people affected is potentially huge. Some 220
million Chinese children and young people have been confined for
prolonged periods due to COVID restrictions, the Education Ministry
estimated in 2020. It did not respond to a Reuters request for an
updated figure and comment on the topic.
KIDS UNDER PRESSURE
The COVID curbs have sometimes forced young people into extreme
situations.
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During Shanghai's two-month draconian lockdown this year, for instance,
some 15 to 18-year-olds had to isolate by themselves at hotels as they
were not allowed to return home.
"They had to cook for themselves and didn't have people to talk to so it
was actually very hard for them," said Frank Feng, deputy principal at
Lucton, an international school in Shanghai, told Reuters.
While data examining youth mental health in China and the impact of
lockdowns and the pandemic is sparse, what there is is grim.
Around 20% of Chinese junior and senior high school students learning
remotely during lockdowns have experienced suicidal ideation, according
to a survey of 39,751 pupils conducted in April 2020 that was published
in the U.S. journal Current Psychology in January. Suicidal ideation is
sometimes described as when a person thinks they would be better off
dead, though the person may not have at the time intent to commit
suicide.
More broadly across age groups, searches for "psychological counselling"
on Chinese search engine Baidu more than tripled in the first seven
months of 2022 compared to the same period a year earlier.
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![](../images/083022PIX/health17.jpg)
A hotline operator for a free
counselling service answers a phone while wearing a face mask, as
the country is hit by an outbreak of the novel coronavirus, in
Shenyang, Liaoning province, China February 12, 2020. cnsphoto via
REUTERS
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2022/Aug/30/images/ads/current/sunag_daily_sda_FAIR_2022.png) For many teenagers, COVID lockdowns
have come during critical exam years. If the stigma of being
infected is not enough, desperation to avoid missing a life-changing
exam due to either catching COVID or, much more commonly, being
considered a close contact has many families isolating for months
ahead of exam periods, teachers said.
Exacerbating that academic pressure are dismal job prospects. While
overall unemployment stands at 5.4%, the rate for urban youth has
soared to 19.9%, the highest level on record, as corporate hiring
withers due to the pandemic and regulatory crackdowns on the tech
and tutoring sectors.
Most students are also only children due to China's 1980-2015
one-child policy and are conscious they will have to help support
their parents in the future.
According to a Fudan University survey of around 4,500 young people
this year, some 70% expressed varying degrees of anxiety.
The pandemic and lockdowns are also thought to be fuelling
disaffection with the intense pressure to get ahead in life,
symbolised by the so-called "lying flat" movement that last year
gained huge social media traction in China as many young people
embraced the idea of doing the bare minimum to get by.
A TWO-DECADE TOLL?
For its part, the Education Ministry has launched a raft of measures
to improve mental health for students during the pandemic, including
the introduction of mandatory mental health classes at colleges and
a drive to ramp up the country's number of school counsellors,
therapists and psychiatrists.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2022/Aug/30/images/ads/current/brandt_sda_FAIR_2022.png)
But mental health has gained attention in China only in the last 20
years and the ministry's efforts to install counsellors in schools
are relatively new. Most schools would not have had one last year.
Guidelines it published in June 2021 call for a ratio of at least 1
counsellor per 4,000 students nationwide.
State media have also taken up the topic.
A June 6 article in the China Daily that focused on the mental
health impact of COVID curbs on vulnerable groups including
teenagers quoted Lu Lin, president of Peking University's Sixth
Hospital, as saying that COVID's "toll on people's mental health
could last over two decades".
Data from early 2020 shows that a third of residents who isolated at
home had experienced conditions such as depression, anxiety and
insomnia, he said.
Lu estimated most would recover after an outbreak subsides but 10%
would be unable to completely return to normal, noting he had
teenage patients who had developed gaming addiction, had trouble
sleeping and continued to be downcast and reluctant to go outdoors.
For Zhang, lockdowns and her subsequent depression have completely
shattered her worldview. Once satisfied with her plans to study
Chinese language and literature, disillusionment with how lockdowns
have been managed has sparked interest in studying abroad.
"I was quite patriotic when I graduated from high school…this
feeling is slowly disappearing. It's not that I don't trust the
government anymore, it's more of a feeling that the smell of masks
and sanitiser has penetrated deep into my bones."
(Reporting by Farah Master in Hong Kong and Xiaoyu Yin in Beijing;
Additional reporting by Casey Hall in Shanghai and Kiki Lo in Hong
Kong; Editing by Edwina Gibbs)
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