The Consumer Credit Counselling Service along with the World Health Organisation and the Office for National Statistics revealed that there was a serious link between highly indebted people and clinically depressed patients. This was observed with more than half of the people in debt found to be diagnosed with mental depression.
It said that this could have been the fallout of the consumer credit trend which was rising at an annual rate of about £113bn. England and Wales had also recorded bankruptcy with 35,898 people in 2004, as against 28,021 in the year 2003. At the same time, the costs to the National Health Service of anti-depressant drugs were also found to have risen to a shocking £400m a year.
This triggered the CCCS to intensify its research further into the relation of debt and depression to clearly understand its implications. It has, therefore, been hearing about 250,000 calls a year from people with debt problems, out of which about 100,000 significant cases are short listed for a detailed interview. The CCCS plans to make a few of these 100,000 people participate in its new survey.
Besides providing a breakthrough in the debt-depression equation, this survey is also being looked at as a way to help the institute train its counselors better in handling such cases.
Posted
on : Mon, 14 Mar 2005 00:00 GMT | Debt News
By : Mark Richardson
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