About Child and Youth Mental Health

Research shows that the average overall community prevalence rate for mental disorders in children and youth is 15%.

This means that in BC, approximately 140,000 children and youth experience mental disorders causing significant distress and impairing their functioning at home, at school, with peers, or in the community.

These mental disorders include any anxiety disorder, conduct disorder, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, any depressive disorder, substance abuse, pervasive development disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, schizophrenia, Tourette's disorder, any eating disorder and bipolar disorder.

To reduce the burden of suffering resulting from children's mental illness, child and youth mental health services are offered throughout British Columbia by the Ministry for Children and Family Development (MCFD). These services provide a wide range of community-based specialized mental health services to mentally ill children and their families.