Morneau Shepell announced the results of its new Mental Health Index, which includes a measure of how the pandemic is impacting Canadian workers’ mental health. The index will be released monthly.

The Mental Health Index found a statistically significant decrease in mental health, when compared to pre-COVID-19 benchmarks. The change represents a current score of 63 compared to the benchmark of 75. The size of the change is unprecedented in the three-year period when the benchmark data was being collected. An overall score of 63 is very concerning. Such a score is typically only seen in the subset of employees who have major life disruption and mental health risk. The largest negative change was seen in the measure of anxiety, followed by helplessness, optimism and isolation.   

In addition to the overall assessment of mental health, the survey also specifically asked about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The majority of respondents (81 per cent) reported that the COVID-19 pandemic is negatively impacting their mental health, ranging from some concern but an ability to cope (49 per cent) to feeling the crisis has a negative, very negative or significantly negative impact on their mental health (32 per cent).