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Psychiatrists, five-fold depressive symptoms
Motor delays, difficulty concentrating and remembering, cognitive impairment in the elderly and five-fold depressive symptoms, to the point of estimating 150,000 more cases of major depression for the next few months: this is the bill that Italians are paying, in terms of mental health, to the Covid-19 pandemic. The psychiatrists of the Italian Society of Psychiatry (Sip) and the Italian Society of Neuropsychopharmacology (Sinpf) take stock today in Milan. On the occasion of the campaign “Together for mental health”, organized by Lundbeck Italia on the occasion of World Mental Health Day on October 10, experts evaluated the psychological and psychiatric impact of the confinement and after the confinement. “The most exposed people were women, adolescents and the elderly – underlines Claudio Mencacci, president of Sinpf – The impact has changed according to the phases: we have gone from the enthusiasm of those who sang on the balconies to fear, then anger and the uncertainty of today “. The main symptoms observed in recent months were “sleep disorders, anxiety and depression, accompanied by increased alcohol consumption, Internet addiction, obsessive-compulsive disorders and cognitive impairment in elderly people deprived of contact” with their families “, continues Mencacci. And psychiatrists also expect an effect from those who have experienced a Covid death in recent months. “We estimate that 10% of these people will develop a severe depressive disorder and we fear the effect that unemployment and impoverishment will have, if it is the expected one,” adds Mencacci. Depressive symptoms increased fivefold, severe symptoms increased more than sevenfold in a few months. “And then there is the phobia, in those who have recovered, of resuming activities and falling ill again,” adds Massimo Di Giannantonio, president of Sip. Many have a deficient pathology, they no longer feel the same as before, but they struggle to ask for help. We will see the effects of all this in a year ”.
