NOBODY can be unaware of the surge of concern about young people’s mental health in recent years. According to NHS figures, one child in five between the ages of eight and 16 has a mental-health disorder. Schools have introduced a proliferation of awareness courses, as well as the teaching of specific techniques, such as cognitive behavioural therapy and mindfulness, aimed at all pupils rather than merely those experiencing difficulties.
Radio 4’s programme on mental health and psychiatry, All in the Mind (Tuesdays), last week explored a new review of clinical trials of such interventions, which found that, at best, they were making no difference — and, at worst, might even be making levels of anxiety and depression worse.
The review examined several “large, expensive, good-quality” studies, according to its leader, Dr Lucy Foulkes, of Oxford. Most damningly, the highest-quality studies were the most likely to find that school-based mental-health interventions had some negative outcomes rather than merely being ineffective. It also seems not to matter which techniques are taught: all seem to produce indifferent-to-negative outcomes, as did merely providing classes in mental-health awareness.
Dr Foulkes thought that using a classroom setting for delivering the interventions might be the root of the problem. In any event, experts now agree that the universal approach does not work, but are divided about what should replace it. At the same time, schools are now legally required to teach about mental health — and so are perhaps compelled to take action that might be damaging their pupils.
Also on Radio 4, Sunday explored the fate of Metropolitan Hilarion (Alfeyev), once the high-profile head of the Moscow Patriarchate’s international department. A former doctoral student of Kallistos Ware at Oxford, he was sent to run the tiny Russian Orthodox Church in Hungary in 2022, an appointment understood as a demotion for his refusal to support the invasion of Ukraine (News, 19 July 2024).
Last year, Metropolitan Hilarion was suspended from even this post after allegations of spying, financial misconduct, and sexual harassment (News, 10 January), all coming from a single source: his own former assistant, a 20-something Japanese citizen, George Suzuki.
In an interview with the BBC’s veteran Budapest correspondent, Nick Thorpe, Metropolitan Hilarion refused to comment on the war or his exile, but claimed that Mr Suzuki had publicly admitted stealing money and expensive watches from his home (Mr Suzuki denies this), and that damning clips of his behaviour towards Mr Suzuki had been doctored. Even if the allegations are false, his credibility has surely been gravely damaged.
More edifyingly, Sunday also briefly explored the devoted service of Sir Bernard Lovell, founder and long-time director of the Jodrell Bank radio telescope, as organist of St Peter’s, Swettenham, a village near by. He even commissioned a new Mander organ for the church.
