The cost of mental health problems
The Institute of Management suggest that 270,000 people take time off every day because of work-related stress.
The Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health says that each year in England alone, mental health problems cost the country over £77 billion. This figure is twice as high as was previously estimated. This figure is made up of:
- £12.5 billion for care provided by the NHS, Local authorities, private services and family and friends
- £23 billion in lost output in the economy caused by people being unable to work
- £42 billion in the human costs of reduced quality of life
These costs dwarf the amount of money aimed at helping mental health. The NHS spends £6.5 billion each year on mental health. In fact the total NHS budget for all health problems is £54.5 billion. Matt Muijen, the Chief Executive of the Sainsbury Centre comments "Effective prevention, treatment, care and support represent good value for everyone's money"
These figures are probably an underestimate as they only look at days off. A more important figure might be that of cut-back days. These is when you go to work but, due to the way you feel, are unable to do as much work as usual. To put this into some kind of context, over 15 million days are lost in the USA each year due to people not going to work while there are over 110 million cut-back days.
These costs increase all the time as the problems become more and more common.
This information comes from an article in the Psychologist, July, 2003.
