One in four UK teenagers in care have attempted to end their lives, study says

"One in four teenagers in care have attempted to end their own life, and are four times more likely to do so than their peers with no care experience, according to a landmark study. The research analysed data from the millennium cohort study, which follows the lives of 19,000 people born in the UK between 2000 and 2002, and considered how out of home care, including foster, residential and kinship care, affected the social and mental health outcomes of the participants."

"Lisa Harker, the director of the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory, said the fact that one in four care-experienced children had attempted suicide was a national emergency. She added: This study also shows that the difficulties that young people have are not inevitable or insurmountable. We can and must do much more to give care-experienced young people the intensive support they need. It is not only morally right that we should do so, it will also pay dividends in reducing lifelong inequalities."

"Alongside teenagers with care experience having a higher likelihood of attempting to end their own life, the study also found this group to have other, multiple negative mental health outcomes in comparison with their peers. Almost six in 10 (56%) teenagers who had experience of foster care had self-harmed, the analysis found, compared with just under a quarter (24%) of teenagers with no care experience."

Analysis of the Millennium Cohort Study of 19,000 people born in the UK between 2000 and 2002 compared outcomes for those who experienced foster, residential or kinship care with peers who never entered care. Twenty-six percent of 17-year-olds who had lived in foster or residential care had attempted to end their own lives, compared with 7% of teenagers with no care experience. Care-experienced teenagers showed higher rates of self-harm and multiple negative mental health outcomes, with 56% having self-harmed versus 24% among peers. The findings prompted calls for intensive support and efforts to reduce lifelong inequalities for care-experienced young people.

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