Re. 'Population mental health in England, 2003–2022: Teasing apart psychological distress, mental illness and activity limitation'

Last month I was struck reading John Burn-Murdoch's regular opinion piece 'Data Points' in the FTWeekend.

This one 'What's really going on with mental health around the world?' concerned a report:

Henking, C. and Baumberg Geiger, B. (2026), 'Population mental health in England, 2003–2022: Teasing apart psychological distress, mental illness and activity limitations'. ESRC Centre for Society and Mental Health, King's College London.
https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/8ygrz_v2

Below I have mapped some points to Hodges' model and added others. 

By accident or not, Mr Burn-Murdoch continued this theme last weekend, discussing pandemic lockdowns and how they never ended for some people (citations below):

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Getting stuck in a psychological minima. Becoming fixed in mindset, lack of self-development through others - empathy, rapport.  Subtle self-harm becoming more serious. What is character in the 21st C? Lack of measures. ^Lack of coherence - parity in health policy. Lack of assertiveness, self-advocacy, prone to self-stigma (non-help seeking!) Qualitative lived experience becomes self-reinforcing (and other - family?)

Getting fixed with a physique, posture - shaped by technology. Physical equivalent-complement  of 'mindset'. Getting stuck in a physical minima 'long-term'. Subtle self-harm becoming more serious. 'Systems medicalisation' PROCESSES Convenience (POLITICAL) of binary responses, e.g.  DISABLED -------- NOT DISABLED Search for 'answers' - diagnosis Search for 'solutions' interventions

Early effect of lack of external play, risk-taking with others, friends - testing - trust. Lack of social skills. Impact of social and other media - reduction of stigma. Social roles models - father-figure?  Lack of 'real' socialisation - meeting peers. Socio-Political Power, hence resort to 'sick role'. Social media - contribution to self-diagnosis.  Support inc. Social prescribing: "You're not listening! How dare you suggest walking, gardening, volunteering, discussion group .. as a way to deal with this!"

'It's life - get on with it!'  The compound effect of 'World News' on young people: cost of living; housing; cost of/access to education; employment options - related to AI; geopolitical events; climate change, state of economics since birth; COVID; housing; and isolation. 'Jobs' for teenagers? (I had a 7-day paper-round)  ^Parity of esteem (see above) Welfare traps -  especially by age xx Realisation of the importance of outdoors play. Streets being protected for children. Early Start Nursery

Imagine four characters called Harlequin meet for dinner. Halfway through another Harlequin gatecrashes the party, called spirit, then add psychiatry, anti-psychiatry, psychology, service users, policy-makers, the pharma-industry and education to the guest list and you are set for a marvellous time.

My source: John Burn-Murdoch, What's really going on with mental health around the world? FTWeekend, 11-12 July 2026, p.10.

John Burn-Murdoch, Pandemic lockdowns never ended for some people. FTWeekend, 15-16 August 2026, p.8.

Previously: 'young people' : 'mental illness' : 'behaviour' : 'Serres'

ii 'GlobalMinds' - NHS study severe mental health problems

GlobalMinds has clearly stated goals and objectives. Three challenges that are highlighted:

1. Diagnosis can take years
2. Treatments target symptoms, not underlying causes
3. Half of the prescribed drugs cause severe side effects

These are, to put it mildly, highly contested issues. Diagnosis in mental health/illness is problematic in several respects, for example:

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a) Lack of Theoretical, Practical and Philosophical(?) agreement between:  Psychology Psychiatry b) Individuals are self diagnosing c) Access to mental health services can be highly structure - single-point entry d) The evidence-base for treatment of mental illness is growing,but remains contested. e) Perhaps there is a phenomena of people getting stuck, with not just a label, but a mindset?	a) Loss of trust in classification/coding schemes: DSM b) Proposed alternatives in - Power Threat Meaning Framework HiTOP c) Data defined scientifically: existing diagnosis biomarker
a) Increased awareness of mental illness, ADHD.. b) Behavioural explanations for mental illness c) The determinants of mental illness (unlike, health?) are poorly researched (hence understood) d) The vocabulary of mental illness (psychiatry) is more widely disseminated, hence used; not necessarily with full contextual understanding e) Stigma associated with mental illness is nevertheless ongoing.	a) Reduced economic productivity b) The socio-economic phenomena of NEETs c) Increased demand on welfare benefits d) The role of primary care - GPs      - fit / sick notes      - 'functional assessors' (Who is best placed?) e) Loss of mental health beds, community compensations incomplete.

This will be a space to watch: and related (global) initiatives? 

Viewed from Hodges' health career - care domains - model, it appears an individual's life chances and expectations (family, and educational experience?) can result in their life chances being frozen?

ii Rare Disease Day 2026

 

myAware - Urgent Rare Disease Day Appeal 2026

Cystinosis

Mersey Gateway Bridge

Just saying i

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Imaginary	numbers
Social	care?

Space for Medicine - ISS

NASA - International Space Station

Space Medicine

International Space Station Update: Thursday, Jan. 8, 2026

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ETHICS CONFIDENTIALITY CONFIDENCE   'COMMS'    MENTAL HEALTH   BEHAVIOURAL HEALTH & PERFOIRMANCE   PRIVATE PSYCHOLOGICAL COMMUNICATION    CIRCADIAN HEALTH PERSON-CENTRED HEALTH/DISABILITY	INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION  distance - remoteness EARTH orbit  LAUNCHES - RE-ENTRY WINDOWS   TRAINING MEDICAL EMERGENCY in SPACE HEALTH - EMERGENCY CONSTRAINTS - CONTIGENCIES PLANNING - TIME - PROBABILITY 'MONTE CARLO' MODELS/SIMULATIONS DIAGNOSIS: INJURY, RADIATION, MUSCULOSKELETAL, NEUROLOGICAL, VISION, microGRAVITY
CREWS WELFARE - PRIORITY  SOCIAL - WELL-BEING	NASA POLICY - PREPAREDNESS MEDIA RELATIONS

NASA Spaceflight Human System Standard Volume 1: 
Crew Health

'NASA-STD-3001 Volume 1 covers the requirements needed to support astronaut health and provide medical care while Volume 2 covers human-related vehicle system design and operations requirements that will maintain astronaut safety and promote performance.'

Additional reading:
Farrell, R.M., Fogarty, J.A., Covington, M. et al. A moonshot for female astronaut health, a win for all astronauts and space exploration. npj Microgravity 11, 38 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41526-025-00495-8

 

Marshall Porterfield, D., Tulodziecki, D., Wheeler, R. et al. Critical investments in bioregenerative life support systems for bioastronautics and sustainable lunar exploration. npj Microgravity 11, 57 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41526-025-00518-4

  

Rizzo, A., Borra, E.M., Ciciani, L. et al. Foundations of radiological protection in space: the integrated multidisciplinary approach for next manned missions in deep space. Eur. Phys. J. Plus 138, 1001 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/s13360-023-04572-3

The National Space Institute -  
https://nss.org/the-national-space-institute/

During the 1990s I was a member of the 
Space Nursing Society -
https://nss.org/space-nursing-society-chapter/ 

London Institute of Space Policy and Law - 
https://www.space-institute.org

 

See also: 'NASA' : 'astronautics'

 

Beyond Empathy to System Change: Four Poems on Health by Bertolt Brecht

The canalization of a river 
The grafting of a fruit tree 
The education of a person 
The reconstruction of a state. 
These are all instances of a fruitful critique 
And they are also
 Instances of art. 
—Bertolt Brecht, “On the Critical Attitude”

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'The education of a person'	'The canalization of a river The grafting of a fruit tree'
'These are all instances of a fruitful critique And they are also Instances of art.' —Bertolt Brecht, “On the Critical Attitude”	'The reconstruction of a state.'

MacGregor, W., Horn, M. & Raphael, D. Beyond Empathy to System Change: Four Poems on Health by Bertolt Brecht. J Med Humanit 45, 53–77 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-023-09801-5

My source: 

Politics of Health Group Mail List Messages
Visit PoHG on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/282761111845400
Follow us on Twitter: @pohguk
You can subscribe to / unsubscribe from the PoHG mail list here: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/POHG
And SDOH list - https://listserv.yorku.ca/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=sdoh&A=1

See also: 'drama' : 'empathy' : 'poetry' : 'change' : 'art'

btw: A game in 4 moves*

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btw - by the way: "Are you working?" 'THE WORK ETHIC' MENTAL STATE MENTAL ILLNESS MOTIVATION MINDSET-ATTITUDE LIFELONG LEARNING	Economic activity Demographics Productivity PHYSICAL HEALTH PHYSICAL ILLNESS dis-ABILITY 'Plumbus oscillans?' EDUCATION - re-TRAINING
Social trends Social attitudes Social capital 'Living wage' 'Cost of Living' Social contract Social justice	Welfare spending, inc. Sickness-Incapacity Political: angst,bias,debate .. Policy^: incentives, action BACK TO WORK - btw

*Or 5 - [ ( sciences, intra- interpersonal, sociology, political ) spiritual ]?

^Fitness for purpose?

Summer reading and books for review

I look forward to reading and reviewing these books. Many thanks to:

• Tom Griffiths - Julian Richer's office
• CUP
• Springer Nature Customer Service

Julian Richer (Author), Kate Miller (Editor) (2024) Our Housing Disaster: - and what we can do about it. London: Richer Publishing and Media. 

https://www.richersounds.com/our-housing-disaster.html

Joaquim Braga & Mário Santiago de Carvalho (eds.) (2021) Philosophy of Care - New Approaches to Vulnerability, Otherness and Therapy. Cham: Springer Verlag.

https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-75478-5

I will advise on how / whether informs my online presentation this coming week at:

MYTH, RITUAL AND PRACTICE

FOR THE AGE OF ECOLOGICAL CATASTROPHE

Fritjof Capra, Pier Luigi Luisi (2014) The Systems View of Life - A Unifying Vision. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 

https://www.cambridge.org/gb/universitypress/subjects/life-sciences/genomics-bioinformatics-and-systems-biology/systems-view-life-unifying-vision?format=HB&isbn=9781107011366 

All three could have a role to play?

"Maslow's hierarchy of needs hides housing horror" c/o Gary Backler in FTWeekend

"John Burn-Murdoch sets out graphically the intergenerational horror story of housing in Britain since 1980 (Opinion, January 13). ...

Abraham Maslow, the American psychologist, placed the need for "shelter" at the very bottom of his famous hierarchy of needs. 
We used to know this. I have a photo of my newly married parents' first rentbook for the council house into which they moved in 1953. It is clear on the cover that after the "accountant to the council", the next most responsible officer is the "medical officer of health". ...

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mental health emotional needs	physical health shelter/physical security
social needs - belonging social care society	Rentbook for council house in 1953 © Gary Backler

Backler, Gary, Maslow's hierarchy of needs hides housing horror, Letters. FT Weekend, 20-21 January 2024, p.8.
Ack. Financial Times. https://www.ft.com/content/3b8719f6-d8e9-4997-b9b5-7dd7ba96fc08

Previously: Maslow.

Books: NHS 75

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Our Stories: 75 Years of the NHS from the People Who Built It, Lived It and Love It
https://www.england.nhs.uk/nhsbirthday/events-and-news/new-book-celebrates-nhs-staff-at-75/

Fighting for Life - The Twelve Battles that Made Our NHS, and the Struggle for Its Future
https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/321469/fighting-for-life-by-hardman-isabel/9780241504345

Book: The Future of Social Care [open access]

"This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 License. It is free to read, download and share on Elgaronline.com. Foreword by David Brindle In the face of major global demographic change, social care policy and practice are in urgent need of radical reform and reassessment. Rising poverty, inequality and pressure on local communities internationally, are also increasing the urgent need for reform. Drawing on the crisis-ridden UK experience as a case-study, this highly original book identifies the limits of the traditional welfare state in taking forward policy for the twenty-first century. The proposals amount to a renewed approach to social care, based on the philosophy of independent living as originally developed by the international disabled people’s movement and subsequently embodied in a United Nations treaty applicable to all in need of care and support. Despite wide international sign up since adoption in 2008 there is little evidence of any nation successfully delivering. For the first time, this book offers both a blueprint for an environmentally sustainable, rights-based approach to social care and a practical route to achieving it."

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Beresford, P., & Slasberg, C. (2023). The Future of Social Care. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing. Retrieved Jul 22, 2023, from https://doi.org/10.4337/9781803923017

Book - Free and Equal: What Would a Fair Society Look Like

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psychology Subjective experience: of freedom and being equal self-interest "Rawls transformed political philosophy, Chandler says. But his thought can be used to transform and reimagine 'progressive politics for the twenty-first century', too. After a half-decade of populist insurgency, the democratic world is at a 'crossroads', he contends, and we are in desperate need of new ideas to renovate a tattered social contract. That's where Rawls comes in." Derbyshire, p.9.

"Imagine being asked to cut a cake into five slices without knowing which slice you'll end up with. Rational self-interest dictates you'd cut slices of roughly equal size. Similarly, the participants in Rawl's thought experiment, behind the veil of ignorance, choose two fundamental principles of justice: a 'basic liberties principle', which says that every one has an equal claim to a suite of fundamental rights and liberties, obviously a precondition of liberal democracy; and a 'difference principle', according to which social and economic inequalities can only be justified to the extent that they benefit the worst off." p.9 trickle-down   ||  'drip'

Society Social Justice Fairness Social contract

economics    ||  'pricing'  Free and Equal

Derbyshire, J. (2023) Justice, fairness and why Rawls still matters today. FT Weekend, Life&Arts, Books, 22-23 April. p.9.

Chandler, D. (2023) Free and Equal: What Would a Fair Society Look Like? London: Penguin.

Call for Papers (i) Community Development and Preventative Care With Older People: New Values and Approaches

Editors: Fiona Verity, Frances Barker, Mark Llewellyn, Simon Read, and Jonathan Richards

Deadline for Abstracts: 15 March 2023
Deadline for Articles: 31 July 2023
Publication of the Issue: January/March 2024

Social Inclusion, peer-reviewed journal indexed in the Social Sciences Citation Index (Web of Science; Impact Factor: 1.543) and Scopus (CiteScore: 2.5), welcomes new and exciting research papers for its upcoming issue "Community Development and Preventative Care With Older People: New Values and Approaches," edited by Fiona Verity (Swansea University), Frances Barker (Solva Care), Mark Llewellyn (University of South Wales), Simon Read (Swansea University), and Jonathan Richards (University of South Wales).

The subject of this thematic issue is a prevention agenda in social care for older people, with a focus on community development values and approaches. Though current policy direction across many countries suggests opportunities for re-imagining how prevention may be best conceptualised, numerous studies have highlighted that there remains considerable confusion and disparity in how this plays out in practice. 

Prevention in social care can be implemented from mixed starting points, i.e., economic objectives, social justice objectives, and look different in practice. Included within this broad agenda are community development approaches and service delivery models driven by the needs of older people in their communities/localities, and collectively focused on common concerns and solutions.

This thematic issue will canvass questions such as:

• What can be learnt from social care preventative practices with older people that use community development approaches?
• How might older people be part of a reimagination of a preventative agenda in social care?
• What can social enterprises and cooperatives contribute to advancing a prevention agenda in social care?
• What might the marketisation of service delivery systems (e.g., individualised/direct payments) mean for community development solutions and approaches?
• How can prevention in social care be better conceptualised?
• What has been learnt from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on older populations to inform a prevention agenda in social care?

Authors interested in submitting a paper for this issue are encouraged to read the full call for papers:
https://www.cogitatiopress.com/socialinclusion/pages/view/nextissues#PreventativeCare

Abstracts welcome by 15 March 2023.

Kindest regards,
Mariana

Mariana Pires Social Inclusion Cogitatio Press 1070-129 Lisbon Portugal New issues (open access): Vol 11, No 1 (2023): Disability and Social Inclusion: Lessons From the Pandemic
https://www.cogitatiopress.com/socialinclusion/issue/view/332 Vol 10, No 4 (2022): Networks and Contested Identities in the Refugee Journey
https://www.cogitatiopress.com/socialinclusion/issue/view/331

My source:
EUROPEAN-SOCIOLOGIST list

Post ii: https://hodges-model.blogspot.com/2023/02/h2cm-relational-ontology.html

Seeking Welfare in Lawfare

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Welfare?	Welfare? [or SLAP(P)s in the face]
Welfare?

 Source: Various.

See also: SLAPPs: Getting Sued for Speaking Out, George W. Pring, and Penelope Canan.

Book: "The Unintended Consequences of Technology" - UCOT

Solutions, Breakthroughs, and the Restart We Need

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"The Unintended Consequences of Technology" UCOT	here ... [or, full-steam ahead?] UCOT
... here ...	... and here?

Book cover: c/o Wiley

ii This post reflects the two-sides of technology:

Territories of Belief, Community, Nature and Technology i

More posts to follow over coming months on this theme ...

Yes, size matters

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	Hammond, G. 'The mini market'. House&Home, City Living Special, FTWeekend, 4-5 May 2019, pp.8-9. https://www.ft.com/content/03a9343e-6b35-11e9-80c7-60ee53e6681d

This morning I shared three slides with the PAMHOP research team and greatly appreciate the opportunity to present and join their meeting:

Physical and Mental Health of Older Prisoners (PAMHOP)

As I spoke of considering the environment and the carceral context across the domains of the model, I recalled another piece of paper.

The image above is from FTWeekend in 2019.

In prison of course, while the physical environment is the intended constraint, the model also invites consideration of the psychological, social, political environments and added here - the spiritual.

Since 2019 and post-COVID, the change in how we regard and value the spaces we inhabit - voluntarily or otherwise.

Hammond, G. 'The mini market'. House&Home, City Living Special, FTWeekend, 4-5 May 2019, pp.8-9. https://www.ft.com/content/03a9343e-6b35-11e9-80c7-60ee53e6681d

The image above was copied from FTWeekend and pasted into a new image and saved from avif format to .jpg.

 

ERCIM News No. 126 Special Theme: "Privacy-Preserving Computation"

Dear ERCIM News reader,

ERCIM News No. 126

ERCIM News No. 126 has just been published at https://ercim-news.ercim.eu/

The Special Theme of this issue focuses on current research on privacy-preserving computation, coordinated by our guest editors Rudolf Mayer (SBA Research) and Thijs Veugen (TNO and CWI).

Thank you for your interest in ERCIM News. Feel free to forward this message to anyone who might be interested.

Next issue:
No. 127,  October 2021
Special Theme: "Smart and Circular Cities" (submissions welcome!)

Peter Kunz  (with thanks)
ERCIM Office

2004, Route des Lucioles
BP93
F-06902 Sophia Antipolis Cedex

https://www.ercim.eu
--------------------------------
@ercim_news
http://twitter.com/ercim_news

join the ERCIM Linkedin Group
https://www.linkedin.com/groups/81390/

[I have edited to reduce the number of links.]

SIMPOL Supporters Q&A - Corporation tax

Dear Peter,

As a supporter of the Simultaneous Policy (SIMPOL) campaign to solve global problems, we’d love you to join us at our next SIMPOL Supporters Q&A zoom meeting. It’ll be on Tuesday 13^th July at 8pm UK time.

We’ll be discussing the recent international agreement on a minimum level of corporation tax signed by over 130 countries. But will it work? To answer that question and others, we’re delighted to have Richard Murphy of the Tax Justice Network with us. He’ll explain the agreement, whether it’ll be effective, and answer your questions. Your hosts will be Rob Cobbold of the Conscious Evolution Podcast and me, John Bunzl, SIMPOL’s founder.

Edited: please ask people to register by sending an email to info@simpol.org and we will then send them the link.

You’ll be very welcome. We look forward to seeing you then!

Best wishes,

John

John Bunzl – Trustee

International Simultaneous Policy Organisation

https://www.simpol.org

Topic: Simpol Supporters Q&A zoom

Time: Jul 13, 2021 08:00 PM London

Mother?

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Give Up!	Give Up!
GIVE UP!	GIVE UP![You will!]

 

... your baby

 

My source: BBC Radio 4 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-57251782

Immersed in the Politics of Health: Nursing #IYNM2020

We tend to treat virtual reality as a creation of the late 20th century, one that is still waiting to find commercial maturity in the 21st. A dictionary, text book and most definitely a web-search will confirm the same.

Perhaps though every age has its VR? The horse, steam, telegraph, electricity have all challenged beliefs, convention, language, society and institutions. The vision of individuals demonstrating courage, invention, creativity and innovation to instill change, has and will always be 'political'.

The celebration of Florence Nightingale's life and achievements also invites acknowledgement of the many pioneers who founded and established nursing across the globe.

In this 21st Century there can be no doubt that Nursing is political. Florence Nightingale immersed herself in the political virtual reality of her day. Nightingale used data, statistics and visualisation to challenge and change health-related political reality. How ironic that so many cities and towns presently breathe the benefit of fresher air today.

Ready or not, we continue to witness the power of language, as nurses and carers who have lost their lives are described as 'heroes'.

Discussion, debate and argument will follow and resonate for months, if not years.

Nursing should and must continue to define, refine and press with all the professional force it can muster; to further the values and delivery of universal access to health information, health care and  improved health literacy and the welfare this can bring for all.

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	Florence Nightingale – € 1.35 VI Definitive Stamp