Prognosis
UK’s Mental Health Crisis Drives 500,000 Onto Benefits, IFS Says
- Think tank points to evidence including ‘deaths of despair’
- Labour government planning to curtail ballooning welfare bill
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Half a million more people in England and Wales are claiming disability benefits for mental-health problems than before the pandemic, according to research that may add to concerns over government plans to squeeze welfare spending.
The analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies pointed to a surge in “deaths of despair,” rising numbers of people accessing mental health services and climbing disability benefit claims as evidence of a worsening crisis in the workforce.