Aussie kids in crisis calling Kids Helpline every minute, shocking new statistics show

Kids’ counsellors are calling police and ambulances 53 times a week to help suicidal or abused children as young as five.

Kids’ counsellors are calling police and ambulances 53 times a week to help suicidal or abused children as young as five.

Shocking new statistics from Kids Helpline show a child is calling for help every minute, with child abuse notifications soaring by two-thirds as kids were harmed under the cover of COVID-19 lockdowns in 2020.

More than 13,000 calls were made by suicidal children last year, including 1150 with “immediate intentions’’ or a current attempt to kill themselves.

Primary school kids aged five to nine made a dramatic 80 per cent increase in calls to the helpline, which was founded 30 years ago today by Yourtown.

Girls made 75 per cent of calls to the hotline.

Lockdowns have fuelled the crisis for children, with duty of care interventions soaring.

The number of “duty of care interventions’’ – where counsellors had to call police, ambulances or Child Safety to help children suffering abuse or attempting suicide – soared by half during 2020.

Counsellors made 2783 reports, with 37 per cent relating to a suicide attempt and 35 per cent involving child abuse.

They include 754 in NSW, 746 in Victoria, 644 in Queensland, 263 in South Australia, 161 in Western Australia, 42 in the ACT and 28 in the Northern Territory.

Nationally, the number of child abuse reports to government agencies jumped 62 per cent, the 2020 statistics, to be released today, reveal.

Nearly 7000 calls came from children suffering domestic violence, and 45,000 from kids with mental health issues.

Lockdowns in Melbourne fuelled the crisis for children, with duty of care interventions soaring 48 per cent last year, compared to 2019.

During the second lockdown, from July to September, referrals to police, ambulance and Child Safety for children “at imminent risk of serious harm’’ were 46 per cent higher than in the previous three months.

Kids Helpline Chief Executive Tracy Adams, Picture: Supplied

Kids Helpline project manager Leo Hede said many households had become “particularly tense’’ during lockdowns.

“Stressed families meant we heard from young people at risk of abuse from family members,’’ he said.

“Where schools and other community connections may have previously played a role supporting young people at risk of abuse, the extended lockdowns and home schooling may have led to an increase in young people seeking support from us.’’

Mr Hede said the second lockdown was a lot longer, “so this compounded stress, isolation and loneliness’’.

“Children and young people also felt the impact of rolling media and news coverage – the high illness rates, the death tolls, and their ‘doom scrolling’ through their social media feeds,’’ he said.

Mr Hede said young children in primary school were calling “with worries, fear, sadness, loss and grief’’.

Teenagers were anxious about school, employment and travel opportunities.

Yourtown chief executive Tracy Adams said the pandemic had exacerbated mental health problems for some children at risk of suicide.

She said children worried about their grandparents dying of COVID-19 or their parents losing work – with some reluctantly reporting sexual and physical abuse.

“Children love their parents and even when there are situations at home we they are not safe, children express that they don’t want their parents to get into trouble,’’ she said.

“For some of them, (abuse) is all they’ve ever known, they don’t know anything different.

“We often talk about stranger danger, but harm can be done by people you know.’’

Kids Helpline fielded 176,000 calls and 2.1 million website visits from children and young people last year – up 21 per cent from 2019.

But one in three calls went answered, despite Kids Helpline doubling the number of counsellors to 200 in the past year.

One in four calls related to mental health, one in seven were about suicide, one in 13 were about child abuse and one in 14 about self-injury.

Ms Adams said the federal government had donated an extra $4 million last year and Kids Helpline hoped to retain the bonus grant this year.

Tianna Stevens, 22, a student at the University of Queensland, said Kids Helpline saved her life when she was suicidal at the age of 18, while studying away from her family in Sydney.

“That counsellor stayed on the phone with me the entire time until the police came and found me in my dorm,’’ she said.

“Literally, the Kids’ Helpline counsellor saved my life.’’

Kids Helpline 1800 55 1800

www.kidshelpline.com.au

Lifeline 13 11 14

www.lifeline.org.au

Originally published as Aussie kids in crisis calling Kids Helpline every minute, shocking new statistics show