Personal Impact of COVID-19 on Australians with a Mental Illness

This report discusses the severe impact of COVID-19 on the mental health of Australians, focusing on a client-centered perspective. It explores the challenges faced by individuals and highlights three online services available for support. The principles of Recovery Consumer Participation are also discussed. The report concludes by emphasizing the importance of mental health support during the pandemic.

Personal impact of COVID-19 on
Australians with a mental illness

Table of Contents
Introduction .....................................................................................................................................3
Main Body.......................................................................................................................................3
1. Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental illness from a client centred perspective..3
2. Principles of Recovery Consumer Participation and how this might assist consumers and
their families carers post the COVID-19 epidemic................................................................4
3. Three online services that are available in Australia to support consumers and their families
with a mental illness ..............................................................................................................4
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................5
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................6

Introduction
Impact of pandemic COVID-19 on mental health of Australians has been severe because,
culture of this country signifies outgoing, friendly and extrovert people who live life to fullest.
Heightened number of people dealing depression, domestic violence, loneliness along with the
child abuse was being found in Australia (Kar and et. al., 2020). This report will be discussing
the effect of COVID-19 on mental health conditions of Australians using client centred
perspective based approach. It has been analysed that, when government of Australia took the
decision of locking down the whole country due to Pandemic COVID-19, it's citizens has gone
through different range of difficulties like they experienced depression, high worry and anxiety
as well. Therefore, report will also be covering different aspects like 3 different online services
which are available for Australians to reduce pressure from individuals dealing with different
range of difficulties.
Main Body
1. Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental illness from a client centred perspective
Considering the client centred perspective where citizens of Australia when faced
lockdown due to outbreak of Corona Virus (COVID-19), mental health was specifically being
affected the most. Different impacts that came in front of COVID-19 was initiation of social
distancing, self-isolation, rise in risk within depressive disorder related cases. In present context,
client centred perspective can be defined as a non-directive type of therapy which is utilised by a
psychiatrists in order to develop an effective therapeutic relationship that may help them in
leading towards lasting changes and insights within an individual dealing with a problem like
outbreak of Corona Virus. (Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Adult Mental Health, 2020)
The impact of COVID-19 on mental illness while focusing on a client centred perspective can be
understood with a good example of divergence of experiences faced by different Australians
where considering a case of Cynthia Boddington (71 year old) and Andrew (Son of Cynthia
Boddington). In present context, adapting the life of lockdown was pretty much easy for Cynthia
Boddington but in the case of Andrew, he faced ample number of difficulties like anxiety, severe
depression and so on. The reason that came in front was the extrovert and outgoing nature of
Andrew. Therefore, it can be said that some of the individuals have considered this lockdown
phase as positive and some of them are going through different range of difficulties. Including

this, it has been found that due to outbreak of Corona Virus individuals are worried for their
business and has lost job as well and also the impact on career and family is much more
significant, and the uncertainty hard to deal with (Fofana and et. al., 2020).
2. Principles of Recovery Consumer Participation and how this might assist consumers and their
families carers post the COVID-19 epidemic
Principles of Recovery Consumer Participation can be considered as progressive
engagement approach utilised by clients (their consent, carers and family). It has been analysed
that this involves different range of considerable aspects towards service offered at broad level
by a service care provider. On the other hand, recovery consumer participation specifically
empowers and focuses on consumers and they may also deliver controlling tools among different
range of situations (Yao, Chen and Xu, 2020). In present context, different principles which may
help consumers including the family carers in relation to COVID-19 are presented underneath:
 Service providers must understand that the way to take support of family and carers as
well.
 Nurses may effectively relate to & speak to and about carers and consumers as well.
 Including this, carers and consumers would required to relate themselves with staff
members.
 Programmes in relation to anxiety and depression are are required to be properly
structured.
 Lastly, organisations in Australian embraces consumer driven initiatives in order to
reduce the impact of depression.
3. Three online services that are available in Australia to support consumers and their families
with a mental illness
The three different online services that are continuously helping Australia to support
consumers and their families with mental health illness and these are presented underneath: Beyond Blues: 1800-512-348 is considered to be the phone line, which stays available
and online support is also being given by government of Australia in order to deliver
support to families and consumers as well(Montemurro, 2020). This website will be
regularly updated with information, advice and strategies to help an individual and
manage the well-being and mental health during this time. And citizens of Australia can

stay up-to-date by joining the email community in relation to any updates on Corona
Virus and so on. Coronavirus Mental Well-being Support Service (Lifeline): 131 114 is the phone line
available in Australia and also, chat support is also being given to individuals so that they
could effectively talk with the representative and share the information like how they are
feeling and so on.
 Carers Connection Line: This is considered to be both online and phone services given
by Government of Australia to the individuals dealing with mental health issues and the
number is 1300-554-660. If an individual is a family member, friend, or carer of someone
with a mental illness, call the Carers Connection Line if the person would like to receive
information, referrals and support (Mental health services and support contact list, 2020).
CONCLUSION
With the help of above mentioned report, it is being concluded that impact of COVID-19
has been really very crucial on overall mental health conditions of citizens of Australia. On the
other hand, it is also summarised that there are a range of online services that are specifically
helping individuals dealing with mental health issues that took place because of COVID-19.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Fofana, N. K. and et. al., 2020. Fear and agony of the pandemic leading to stress and mental
illness: an emerging crisis in the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. Psychiatry
Research, p.113230.
Montemurro, N., 2020. The emotional impact of COVID-19: From medical staff to common
people. Brain, behavior, and immunity.
Kar, S. K. And et. al., 2020. Homeless mentally ill people and COVID-19 pandemic: The two-
way sword for LMICs. Asian Journal of Psychiatry. 51. p.102067.
Yao, H., Chen, J. H. and Xu, Y. F., 2020. Patients with mental health disorders in the COVID-19
epidemic. The Lancet Psychiatry. 7(4). p.e21.
Online
Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Adult Mental Health. 2020. [Online]. Available through:
<https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7306943/>.
Mental health services and support contact list. 2020. [Online]. Available through:
<https://www.health.nsw.gov.au/mentalhealth/services/Pages/support-contact-
list.aspx>.