Already struggling with COVID-19 pandemic from last 3 months, every Indian got the shock when a news broke about a highly promising Bollywood celebrity Sushant Singh Rajput, age 34. committed suicide in his Mumbai’s flat reportedly because of severe depression. Since this was a high-profile case, it got the worldwide attention, otherwise every year lakhs of people especially those of younger population try to end their lives as a result of depression and other mental conditions. As incidents of mental illnesses increases sharply across the globe, so are the suicide cases. Nearly 800,000 people die by suicide worldwide every year, of these 135,000 (17%) belong to India. Actual people who attempt to commit suicide are nearly 10 times higher. Rest 90% survive, as per the study.
All over the world including in India, the incidents of mental illnesses are rising sharply and almost taking the shape of a ‘global epidemic’. Among the most common health disorders are depression and anxiety. A report by the WHO revealed that 7.5% of the Indian population suffers from some form of mental disorder. The Lancet, a well-regarded medical Journal published from the UK, published a report titled “The burden of mental disorders across the states in India: “The Global Burden of Disease Study 1990- 2017” released in February, 2020. The study claim that nearly 197 million Indians were suffering from mental disorders, including 45·7 million reported to have depressive disorders, and 44·9 million were suffering with anxiety disorders. It’s believed that today nearly 264 million of the world population suffer from depression. At its most severe, depression can lead to suicide.
Depression is a common mental disorder and one of the main causes of disability worldwide. Depression is mainly characterized by sadness, loss of interest, feelings of guilt, low selfesteem, disturbed sleep and poor concentration. The worst part is that most of them are not aware that they are suffering from any mental condition. The prominent symptom of depression is a continuous feeling of sadness with the sense of absolute hopelessness. The person can’t see any hope in future. Negative feelings overpower them badly. In most of the cases, during early stages, people are hesitant to seek therapy or medication due to fear, and age-old stigmas. In later stages, patients are put to medication only. Unfortunately, anti-depressant drugs have serious side effects in many cases.
The primary reason behind such a sharp rise in mental disorders and illnesses is the life style we have adopted in modern age. The way we live, think and work badly affect our physical and mental wellbeing. Far too many of us are preoccupied with the material world, striving to possess more and more material goods, eager for ever more comforts in life. The measure of one’s success is not happiness but wealth, status, and power one acquires. Many cases attach greater value on those attainments than on their intrinsic spiritual nature. Though most people will say that their first priority in life is to be happy and enjoy life, their real motives may focus on possessing material things. Ironically, chasing material success in pursuit of greater happiness may bring more discontentment and unhappiness in life. That’s why celebrities, public figures, rich and famous are equally prone to mental health problems. As a result, a large section of society becomes vulnerable to psychological stress, emotional distress, addictive behaviour, feeling of loneliness, attention deficit due to high distraction (owing to social media and glamour).
Mental health problems generally start with excessive mental stress due to particular situation (like death of close one, detection of serious disease like cancer etc) or series of events. Mental illnesses may be caused by a reaction to environmental stresses, genetic factors, biochemical imbalance (secretion of serotonin in brain) or their combination. Under those circumstances, people unable to think, feel or act in ways they want to. To manage thoughts under those distressing moments is not an easy way. More we try to suppress our negative or troubling thoughts, more forcefully they resurface. Even if we divert our attention to entirely different thing, we are not able to focus on present. This condition leads to ‘overthinking’. Same set of disturbing thoughts come in the mind despite our best efforts. Mental illnesses like depression, anxiety, or attention deficit disorder invariably start with our inability to manage toxic and distressing thoughts. Then a time may come when those thoughts become uncontrollable.
The way the mental health conditions are increasing, the World Health Organization (WHO) has also warned that these problems will be the main cause of disability in the world in 2030. Now people, already suffering from mental health conditions are further being affected adversely by the emotional responses elicited by COVID-19 pandemic. This is resulting in further deterioration of their existing mental health condition due to chronic stress, caused by economic and psychological turmoil.
Now, as a result of COVID-19 pandemic, the people are deeply impacted by way of loss of jobs and livelihood, deep uncertainty (as to how long pandemic will last), fear of infection, dying and losing their family members. Losing a job is one of life’s most stressful events. Huge workforce has already lost their livelihoods due to complete or partial shutdown of economic and commercial activities. We can well imagine the severity of suffering and emotional distress of their families on the loss of regular income. Due to the economic turmoil that the country is undergoing, people are increasingly showing signs of increased psychological distress and suffering. The COVID-18 pandemic is therefore posing a tremendous challenge to people’s mental health and wellbeing.
The emerging crisis has either triggered a wide variety of fresh psychological problems, such as anxiety and depression or deterioration of mental conditions of people already under treatment. According to one study, nearly one-third of people surveyed had experienced varying degree of psychological distress due to pandemic. On the other hand, government machinery especially doctors and other health experts are badly occupied with COVID patients so they are not able to provide medical help, care and therapy to those who badly need during this period.
Mental health can be strengthened by any strenuous physical exercise such as sports, aerobics, dance and following one’s passion. For mental exercises, the most important intervention is meditation preferably along with besides yoga and pranayama/breathing exercise. Through this exercise we can manage our thoughts especially during challenging moments of life. In the recent past, thousands of research papers have confirmed the transformational changes that come with meditation. Even aging can be slowed to a great extent by the stress-reducing practice of meditation. People become happier and more peaceful when they meditate.
This is the right time that the Central Government should come out with national framework/policy guidelines for mentally and psychologically vulnerable people for ensuring adequate safeguards against social isolation, loneliness and mental illnesses as a consequence of COVID pandemic. Social care and psychological support including counselling and therapy through government institutions and NGOs should be extended through right mix of technological intervention and personal contact. Efforts must be made through social media to talk and discuss about mental issues like depression and suicidal thoughts.
We must collectively redress the problem of social taboo against mental health problems. Telemedicine, tele-therapy and counselling through digital platforms should be promoted extensively for this category of mentally vulnerable and lonely people. The government and the institutions responsible for mental wellbeing of people must take Sushant’s suicide as a wake-up call for impending mental health crisis in India.
Balvinder Kumar is MemberUttar Pradesh – Real Estate Regulatory Authority (UPRERA). As an IAS officer, he served as Secretary, Ministry of Mines; Vice-Chairman of Delhi Development Authority (DDA) and Vice Chairman, Lucknow Development Authority (LDA). He is the author of two books – ‘Redesign Your Life in Modern Age’ and ‘Explore Your Life Journey’.