Government official: Mental Health Road Show for youth to be launched this week

Citing a survey by UNICEF in Hungary in 2022, Zsofia Nagy-Vargha said that 66 percent of respondents spoke of having experienced some form of bullying at school.

Social media has fundamentally altered the ways and means for the youth to communicate, she said and cited a recent study by the European Commission showing that some 22 percent of the youth spoke of feeling lonely which was seen as a cause of anxiety, low self-esteem and in some cases body shaming.

“It is interesting to see that amidst this revolution of communication allowing everyone the possibility to immediately reach somebody else, young people do not seem to have anybody at hand with whom they could discuss their problems,” she said. “Whereas young people have the choice to join a virtual community any time, they still say they feel lonely,” said Nagy-Vargha, adding that returning to the real world was rather difficult for them from the online space forced by Covid. She also noted the negative effects of the war in Ukraine to the youth’s mental health.

The campaign will create opportunities to the youth to meet experts and representatives of professional youth help organisations, and learn about their work as well as to participate in work-shops. The road show will also present a theatre performance on secondary school life today, Nagy-Vargha said.