A Critical Comparison of Depression Among Adolescents in Nigeria and the United Kingdom (UK)

Background

According to the WHO (2014 d), depression is the number one cause of health problems and disability amongst adolescents (age 10-19 years). Furthermore, suicide which is the third leading cause of death amongst this age group is strongly associated with severe forms of depression (WHO 2014d). Evidence indicates that half of the mental health disorders in adulthood start during adolescence (WHO 2014d).Therefore, proper intervention and prevention of mental health problems amongst adolescent is important because it will go a long way to ensure good health at adulthood.

 Fatiregun and Kumapayi (2014) proposed that 21.2% of adolescents in Nigeria are moderately depressed while 5.1 % are severely depressed. This finding was based on a study carried out amongst 1713 secondary school students in a rural district of southwest Nigeria. While there are few studies on the incidence and prevalence of depression in Nigeria and particularly amongst adolescents, the sample size of 1713 might not be a good representation of depression amongst adolescents in Nigeria, especially given that Nigeria has a population of about 177,155,752 million people, where about 19.35% of the population are between 15 -24 years of age (Central Intelligence Agency-CIA 2014). Additionally, Nigeria has six geopolitical zones which are South-South, South-West, South-East, North-Central, North-East and North -West. These six geopolitical zones have different cultural practices. Hence, the finding by Fatiregun and Kumapayi  (2014) might not be generalizable in the entire country because it was only conducted  amongst adolescents in  the south-western part of  Nigerian. Furthermore, since approximately 38.7 % of Nigerian citizens are illiterate (CIA 2014), it seems likely that many adolescents are not in school, therefore meaning that Fatiregun and Kumapayi’s (2013)  study might not indicate the exact  burden of depression amongst illiterate adolescents. In addition, considering the fact that the study only uses rural adolescents, this might mask the effect of urbanization on depression amongst adolescents.  However, another study by Adewuyu et al (2006)a, which was carried out in urban Nigeria, found 6.1% of adolescents to be severely depressed. This result does not differ significantly with the burden of 5.1% of severe depression amongst adolescents in the rural setting, as found by Fatiregun and Kumapayi (2013). These results do indicate, however, that depression amongst adolescents in the urban area might be higher than amongst those in the rural areas in Nigeria.

This case study aims, first, to critically analyse the problem of depression in Nigeria amongst adolescents and, second, to compare and contrast the problem in Nigeria and in the United Kingdom, with the ultimate goal of learning transferable interventions