Summary

Week 09 (March 1–7, 2021).

Data on emergency room visits from the Oscour® network

• Among adults aged 15 and older, visits for suicidal behavior, anxiety disorders, and mood disorders remain at levels comparable to or even lower than those of the past two years.

• Among children under 15, after four weeks of decline, visits due to suicide attempts increased in Week 9: 131 visits in Week 9 (vs. 120 in Week 8, an increase of 8%). The observed level remains slightly higher than in previous years: 115 in Q3 2020 and 116 in Q3 2019.

After a week of sharp decline (-39%), admissions for mood disorders (including depressive disorders) are rising again, with 111 admissions in Q9 vs. 94 in Q8, an increase of 8%. The level reached in S09 remains between 1.5 and 3 times higher than in previous years (36 and 71 visits in S09 of 2020 and 2019, respectively).

These increases are observed every year during the post-winter-break period and typically last for one to two weeks.

Medical procedure data from the SOS Médecins associations

• Following an increase in S08, medical procedures for anxiety are down across all age groups except for those under 15, which continued to rise in S09 (36 procedures in S09 vs. 26 in S08, a 31% increase). For all age groups, however, these procedures remain within the fluctuation ranges observed over the past few weeks and at a level higher than those seen in the last two years.

• Procedures for depressive disorders are declining or stable at a level slightly higher than in the previous two years across all age groups, with the exception of those aged 15–44, where they increased in S09 (133 procedures in S09 vs. 116 in S08, a 15% increase). After three weeks of increases, procedures for depressive disorders among people aged 65 and older have returned to their usual fluctuation ranges.

• Procedures for behavioral disorders have remained stable over the past few weeks and are at levels comparable to the past two years across all age groups. Among those aged 65 and older, following an increase in S08 (+34%), the number of procedures decreased by -32% in S09, though the level reached remains higher than in the past two years.

No notable changes were observed in the other mental health indicators under surveillance.