Mental health is an important component of public health, especially in times of
crisis. However, monitoring public mental health is difficult because data are often
patchy and low-frequency1–3. Here we complement established approaches by using
data from helplines, which offer a real-time measure of ‘revealed’ distress and mental
health concerns across a range of topics4–9. We collected data on 8 million calls from 19
countries, focusing on the COVID-19 crisis.
November 2021