London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Wednesday, Oct 08, 2025

UK Children's welfare becoming 'national emergency', health experts warn

UK Children's welfare becoming 'national emergency', health experts warn

A letter to the Observer calls for an urgent review of the long-term impact of lockdowns and school closures on a generation
Boris Johnson is facing demands from doctors, senior politicians and charities for a wide-ranging commission to examine the pandemic’s “devastating effect” on children, amid growing concerns about its impact on their education, development and mental health.

A major coalition of child health experts warns that many families are being “swept into poverty” by the pandemic, which is set to significantly add to the 4 million children living in deprivation before the Covid crisis.

In a letter to the Observer, they also warn of a “yawning gap” in attainment between rich and poor due to school closures, while the number of children facing mental health issues and distress will rise “with every day that lockdown keeps them isolated and uncertain about their futures”.

“Children’s welfare has become a national emergency,” says the letter, whose signatories include the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, the National Children’s Bureau and some of the country’s leading child health academics. “An independent commission, to inform a cross-government strategy to steer children and young people clear from the lingering effects of Covid-19, could avert this deepening crisis. At present we have piecemeal solutions and stop-gap measures. The next generation deserves better.”

It warns that the challenges have been made harder by a decade of cuts to services families rely on. Some 1.5 million children under 18 will either need new or additional mental health support as a result of the pandemic. A third of those are new cases, according to the Centre for Mental Health.

Lee Hudson, a consultant paediatrician and chief of mental health at Great Ormond Street hospital, said: “We know from the data that children and young people’s mental health has been deteriorating in this pandemic.

Clinicians are seeing the effects of that every day: for example, the numbers of children presenting with eating disorders have dramatically increased. For children living in poverty, the risks are even greater. We’ve never needed a long-term strategy for child mental health more.”

The attainment gap was already growing before the pandemic hit. Poor pupils in primary school were 9.2 months behind their peers in 2018, rising to 9.3 a year later, according to the Education Policy Institute.

Dr Xand van Tulleken, presenter of CBBC’s Operation Ouch!, said: “I have been making television programmes and doing online sessions for kids and families through the pandemic. I hear and see every day how the restrictions and disruptions of lockdown present a huge challenge to families and to children.

The urgency of the death toll from Covid has meant that these issues haven’t had the attention they need in order to mitigate against harms to an entire generation. An independent commission would be an excellent starting point to start to address this.”
Advertisement

The call for an independent commission has already gained some political support. Estelle Morris, a former Labour education secretary, said: “It is a cruel irony that the government’s action in policy areas affecting children and young people has been the most chaotic and disorganised. A commission would need to work quickly and the government would need to listen to what it says, but all that must be possible in such an important area.”

David Blunkett, another former Labour education secretary, said he supported the “deep and justifiable concerns” raised by the group. “It needs to be a very rapid process as any delay in acting to reverse the impact would lead to even greater distress and detrimental impact on the life chances on a whole generation,” he said.

Senior Tories also have concerns about the impact of the pandemic. Damian Hinds, who served as education secretary under Theresa May, said: “The signatories are quite right that the impact on this generation is immense and many-faceted, and could still be felt many years from now. The school system, Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services [CAMHS], children’s services departments and others will all face unprecedented challenges and will continue to evolve plans. But it also makes sense to look at the issues as a whole and how they interact.”

Justine Greening, a fellow former education secretary, said: “Britain needs a comprehensive plan to level up opportunity across our country, one that transcends party politics. It’s clear that Covid-19 has brutally widened inequalities, but if we work collectively on solutions then we have the best chance of building a fairer, levelled-up Britain.”

Robert Halfon, the Tory chair of the education select committee, said lockdowns and school closures had “potentially been a national disaster in terms of attainment, mental health and safeguarding hazards”. He added: “In the short term, the government needs to place mental health professionals in schools so that pupils and parents can access them when they need it. In the long term, they need to look at how the pupil premium is spent, rocket-boost the catch-up fund and come up with a real long-term plan for education.”
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
A Dollar Coin Featuring Trump’s Portrait Expected to Be Issued Next Year
Australia Orders X to Block Murder Videos, Citing Online Safety and Public Exposure
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
×