key: cord-0732484-h407k4r0 authors: McDaid, David title: Viewpoint: Investing in strategies to support mental health recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic date: 2021-04-26 journal: Eur Psychiatry DOI: 10.1192/j.eurpsy.2021.28 sha: 91d101511123cea854908e3f985ee35a88cbbd43 doc_id: 732484 cord_uid: h407k4r0 nan Looking at some of the population groups whose mental health has been most disproportionately affected by the pandemic, children and young people would benefit from additional and sustained investment in online and face to face psychological counseling services. Health and social care workers and other frontline professionals who have experienced very high levels of psychological distress during the crisis also need support. Measures to protect their mental health need to be scaled up; these could perhaps include use of brief psychological interventions delivered by paraprofessionals for distress that have been used in conflict/disaster zones. The pandemic has also changed the way in which mental health systems operate [10] , with increased provision of online services and arguably a much greater focus on resilience and wellbeing. This has created great challenges, but it also has provided an opportunity to reshape mental health service delivery so that some of the new investments in online services continue to complement traditional mental health service models. This can help to maximise the opportunities to reach all individuals in mental distress. The temptation among some service planners to try and cut costs by overly relying on digital rather than face to face services should be resisted; such a move would potentially widen mental health inequalities between those who do and do not use digital technology. Of course, long term mental health support plans need to be tailored to individual country contexts. The UK government's recently published Covid-19 mental health and wellbeing recovery action plan for England provides a useful template for policy action [2] . This plan sets out multiple measures that are being taken within and beyond the health system. It includes actions targeted at children and young people, within and outside of school and higher education settings, including, for example, some additional support to help young people into employment training schemes. The plan also encourages frontline workers to make use of freely provided online psychological first aid training, both to improve their awareness of potential risks to mental health, as well as improving their understanding of when to signpost individuals toward specialist services. It recognises and describes specific mental wellbeing and loneliness alleviation initiatives to support other adversely affected groups including women, ethnic minorities, refugees, older people, the homeless, and prisoners. The English plan also recognises the value of additional social protection measures and describes investment in the implementation of a debt respite scheme in which interest and charges on debts are frozen and enforcement action from creditors is paused for at least 60 days, alongside a package of other financial and regulatory measures to reduce risks to mental health that could arise from unmanageable debt. Within the health system, it sets out an aspiration for more integrated mental healthcare that is better linked to primary and community services, as well as sectors such as housing. It also commits to the continued option of face to face services, alongside expanded remote service provision. While it is important for the mental health community to engage with policy makers on the shape of mid to long term mental health recovery plans, implementation will also require funding. As vaccination programmes are rolled out and infection rates fall, pressure will increase to reduce public expenditure. Historically, mental health services have been very vulnerable when public funding is constrained. After the 2008-2009 crisis, mental health systems in some European countries experienced deep budgetary cuts. That crisis economically is but a shadow of the current crisis, where astronomical levels of funds (mainly from borrowing) have been pumped into economies. The mental health community will have to make use of both health and economic arguments to highlight the potential adverse consequences of providing insufficient funding for implementation. The economic recovery in Europe depends on the physical and mental health of its citizens; support for mental health recovery needs to be accurately portrayed as a positive investment that will benefit society rather than a cost to be minimised. Conflict of Interest. The author declares no potential conflicts of interest. 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