The pandemic has not only changed how we learn and live our lives, but have also changed the mental health of almost everyone around the world. The uncertainty of our future, both in school and in general, is what causes feelings of stress, anxiety, and even depression within citizens, but it is shown that COVID-19 has more significantly affected students’, specifically ages 18-29, mental health.
In my previous Civic Issues post, I discussed how COVID-19 has affected students both in school and mentally in the United States, but now I would like to expand the analysis to the other countries, specifically Mexico and South Africa. The United States is within the top 20 “Covid Resilience Ranking” according to Bloomberg (Chang et al., 2022), but there are many countries around the world that were less fortunate and were not able to be as resilient.
Mexico
Education:
Within Mexico, we see a clear portrayal of how economic status affected students’ continuation of education throughout the pandemic. According to EY Parthenon, students who went to private schools in Mexico were able to shift into online school easily because they had more access to the technology/internet access needed to make the transition, whereas students in public schools had little to no access to these necessary resources (Lytle, 2020). EY Parthenon conducted a survey for parents of students in Mexico, who reported that only more than half of the private and public schools combined continued teaching online, and some schools even canceled classes completely. Within the overall 50%, “more than half of parents whose children were enrolled in private schools reported that their children’s schools continued classes online during school closures, compared with only around 20% of parents of students enrolled in public schools,” and “22% of parents in Mexico declared that classes were canceled in their kids’ schools” (Lytle, 2020). Because of this inequality in education, a majority of students within Mexico were either getting a subpar level of education, or none at all. This fact obviously will have an affect on their mental health because this lack of learning will cause the students to be behind in later years, which can lead to anxiety, depression and stress. Now, 2 years later, students in Mexico have adapted the popular “hybrid” teaching method, where the students are learning both online and in-person depending on the day/week.
Mental Health:
Even though Mexico is the 23rd country when it comes to the number of COVID-19 cases, they are 3rd in the number of deaths in the world. This difference in ratings means that although they may not have had many cases compared to others, those who did get COVID-19 in Mexico were mostly likely to die. With this ranking in mind, the National Library of Medicine took it upon themselves to conduct a study in February of 2022, focusing on the mental health of university students in Mexico. The study consisted of 252 university students ranging from ages 18-29 years old and the experimental design was simply a Google Form sent to the students through their school. The survey asked questions based on their current mental state and their living situation and were analyzed using the Depression and Anxiety Stress Scale-21 (DASS-21). The results of the study showed that those who either had a chronic illness, live with someone with a chronic illness, or have come in contact with someone with COVID-19 have higher levels of depression, anxiety, and stress. (Dosil-Santamaria et al., 2022). The researchers also discussed that the uncertainty of the world and their education was a prominent factor in the presence of mental health issues.
South Africa
Education:
South Africa was one of the countries that was most affected by COVID-19, with the students reportedly being between 75% to a full year behind where they should be in school because of the pandemic interrupting the school year (Fricker, 2021). Toby Fricker, the Chief of Communication & Partnerships for UNICEF South Africa, discusses what happened within the schools during the initial shock of the pandemic and how it affected the students. Fricker explained that “different factors such as rotational attendance, sporadic school closures and days off for specific grades, have resulted in school children losing 54% of learning time,”(Fricker, 2021).
A statistic that shocked me and made my stomach turn was :
“Some 400,000 to 500,000 learners have reportedly also dropped out of school altogether over the past 16-months. This is most likely for children living in informal urban and rural settings, with household poverty also playing a critical role. The total number of out of school children is now up to 750,000,” (Fricker, 2021)
Because of being out of a learning environment for so long, students can experience mental issues, be exposed to violence, miss out on school-provided meals, developmental skills, and just overall education that is needed throughout their lives. Many students within South Africa depended on the meals given at school to eat throughout the day, and are now either malnourished or starving completely, which affects more than just their mental health.
Mental Health:
The topic of mental health was already seen as “taboo” within South African culture, so those who have mental illnesses were suffering in silence. When it comes to the effect of COVID-19 on mental health in South Africa, the overall lack of health facilities, or to put it bluntly, care for people’s psychological issues, the numbers of those suffering are going to continue to go up.
A journal by Sage Journal was written about the correlation between mental health and COVID-19 within South Africa. As discussed before, the concept of mental health was not supported in South Africa, to which Sage Journal stated, “that due to public biological, psychological, and social predispositions in South Africa, COVID-19 may lead to mental health presentations such as post-traumatic stress disorder, mood disorders, anxiety disorders, phobias, and obsessive-compulsive disorders,” (Nguse and Wassenaar, 2021) The authors of the journal, Siphelele Nguse and Douglas Wassenaar, backed up their research by reporting that “33% of South Africans were depressed, while 45% were fearful, and 29% were experiencing loneliness during the first lockdown period,” (Nguse and Wassenaar, 2021).
South African students are now not only behind in school or not getting an education, but also are not getting the services they need.
Conclusion:
Mental health is as serious as physical health, but hasnt been discussed nearly as much around the world. While the older generations are more susceptible to actually contracting the world-renown virus, our students are more likely to develop mental health issues. Many of the countries that are most affected mentally are the ones that either don’t believe in mental illnesses or don’t have the resources to help those who are suffering out of the hole they are in. Mexico and South America are just two of those countries. Current students all around the world are our future, but how are they supposed to make it to the future if they are not only battling a pandemic, but also themselves?
Work Cited:
Chang, R., Varley, K., Lew, L., Gitau , M., & Munoz, M. (2022, February 24). The Covid-19 Resilience Ranking. Bloomberg.com. https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/covid-resilience-ranking/(ranking)
Dosil-Santamaria, M., Ozamiz-Etxebarria, N., Idoiaga Mondragon, N., Reyes-Sosa, H., & Santabárbara, J. (2022, February 14). Emotional state of Mexican university students in the COVID-19 pandemic. International journal of environmental research and public health. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8871678/ (Mexico study)
Fricker, T. (2021, July 22). Learners in South Africa up to one school year behind where they should be. Unicef.org. https://www.unicef.org/press-releases/learners-south-africa-one-school-year-behind-where-they-should-be (South Africa)
Lytle, R. (2020, June 1). How COVID-19 has impacted K-12 education in Mexico, Colombia and Peru. ey.com. https://www.ey.com/en_us/strategy/how-covid-19-has-impacted-k-12-education-in-mexico-colombia-and-peru (Mexico)
Nguse, S., & Wassenaar, D. (2021, May 8). Mental health and covid-19 in South Africa – sage journals. Mental Health and COVID-19 in South Africa. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00812463211001543