Citation

Armitage R. Lancet Psychiatry 2021; 8(2): e3.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2021, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/S2215-0366(20)30530-7

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The National Health Service (NHS) of England publishes monthly data on national appointment and prescribing activity in general practice. The total number of appointments in this setting from April 1, 2020, to Sept 30, 2020, was 122 250 549, a 16·51% decrease from the corresponding period in 2019 (146 432 604). This period in 2020 comprises all the data available to date following the first UK COVID-19 lockdown, which began on March 23, 2020. The number of antidepressant prescriptions made in general practice between April 1, 2020, and Sept 30, 2020, was 38 609 032, 3·94% higher than the corresponding period in 2019 (37 144 303). Since child and adolescent mental health services take responsibility for antidepressant prescribing in children, these prescriptions were received by adults.


NHS England also publishes monthly data on the number of people in contact with NHS-funded mental health services (including secondary care and NHS psychological therapies services [IAPT]), and the number of new referrals to those services.The average monthly number of people in contact with adult mental health services between April 1, 2020, and Aug 31, 2020, was 930 576, a decrease by 14·80% from the corresponding period in 2019 (1 092 275). In addition, the average monthly number of new referrals to adult mental health services between April 1, 2020, and Aug 31, 2020 (283 338) decreased by 10·02% from the corresponding period in 2019 (314 885)...

Language: en