20 October 2014 - The Guardian - Gaps in mental health care for new mothers cost UK £8bn a year – study

Substandard mental health care for pregnant women and new mothers is creating long-term costs of more than £8bn every year, according to a pioneering study of the effects of maternal depression, anxiety and other illnesses.

The report, produced by the London School of Economics and the Centre for Mental Health charity, represents the first time academics have sought to quantify not just the direct economic impact on affected mothers, but the effect over decades on their children’s prospects, both in terms of development in the womb and during the crucial early years.

The report was commissioned by the Maternal Mental Health Alliance (MMHA), which groups together dozens of campaigning and professional bodies connected to the issue. The organisation said the NHS would only need to spend a relatively small sum, £337m a year, to bring maternal mental health care up to recommended levels around the country.

With up to 20% of women experiencing mental health problems in pregnancy or the first 12 months after birth, known together as the perinatal period, the study calculated a total cost to the nation averaging £9,900 for each of the 813,000 births in the UK in 2012.

Almost three-quarters of this comes from the future impact on children, the academics said, basing this on research into the effect on foetuses of a mother’s psychological distress, and of impaired care in the first year of life, seen as key to development. Of the £8.1bn total, around a fifth is calculated as being borne by the public sector, with £1.2bn falling on the NHS and social services alone.