ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Public Health
Sec. Public Mental Health
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1635801
Global burden and trends of major mental disorders in population aged under 24 years from 1990 to 2021, with projections to 2050: insights from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2021
Provisionally accepted
Wei Liu1
Yu Zhang2Jie Chen2Xiayang Li2Yishuai Huang2Fuyang Zhao3
Fangyao Chen2*
Pengfei Qu4,5*
Yajun LI1*- 1Northwest Women’s and Children’s Hospital, Xi’an,Shaanxi, China
- 2Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Xi'an Jiaotong University Health Science Center, Xian, China
- 3School of Nursing, Shaanxi University of Chinese Medicine, Xianyang, China
- 4Translational Medicine Center, Northwest Women’s and Children’s Hospital, Xi’an,Shaanxi, China
- 5Central Laboratory, Beijing Obstetrics and Gynecology Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Background Mental disorders are the leading cause of global non-fatal disease burden, with rising prevalence among children, adolescents, and youth. This study analyzed location-, age-, and sex-specific estimates for 9 mental disorders from 1990-2021 using GBD 2021 data, projecting burden to 2050. Methods Methods included calculating average annual percentage change (AAPC) and annual percentage change (APC) for age-standardized prevalence rate (ASPR) and disability-adjusted life years rate (ASDR), alongside decomposition, inequality, frontier, comparative risk, and Bayesian age-period-cohort analyses. Results Compared to 1990, the 2021 global burden significantly increased among youth (the AAPC of ASPR = 0.15, 95% confidence interval (CI) : 0.14 to 0.16; the AAPC of ASDR = 0.40, 95% CI: 0.29 to 0.51), accelerating sharply after 2019 (the APC of ASPR = 4.74, 95% CI 4.55 to 4.93; the APC of ASDR = 6.64, 95% CI 4.88 to 8.42). Males experienced a higher burden than females, with variations in sex-specific patterns across age groups. Burden varied substantially by socio-demographic index (SDI), being highest in high-SDI regions (ASPR = 12913.13, 95% uncertainty interval (UI): 11135.82 to 14874.98; ASDR = 1750.41, 95% UI: 1253.46 to 2328.87). We found that the burden changes of 9 mental disorders vary at the global, regional, and national levels. Decomposition analysis highlighted that the changes in prevalence and the disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) were predominantly driven by population growth (84.86% and 57.92%), with the most significant improvements observed in higher SDI regions. Frontier analysis revealed the potential for burden reduction in higher income countries and territories. Globally, key risk factors included childhood sexual abuse, bullying, intimate partner violence, and lead exposure were identified for anxiety disorders, depressive disorders, and idiopathic developmental intellectual disability, respectively. Projections indicated that the burden of mental disorders is likely to continue its decline in 2050 (ASPR = 6120.71 per 100000, 95% CI: 3973.57 to 8267.85; ASDR = 844.71 per 100000, 95% CI: 529.48 to 1159.94). Conclusion Despite projected rate declines by 2050, the global burden of mental disorders is increasing, with significant disparities across populations and a recent surge demanding intensified prevention and equitable healthcare expansion worldwide.
Keywords: Mental Disorders, Disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs), health inequality, globalburden, projections to 2050
Received: 27 May 2025; Accepted: 29 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Liu, Zhang, Chen, Li, Huang, Zhao, Chen, Qu and LI. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Fangyao Chen, Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Xi'an Jiaotong University Health Science Center, Xian, China
Pengfei Qu, Translational Medicine Center, Northwest Women’s and Children’s Hospital, Xi’an,Shaanxi, China
Yajun LI, Northwest Women’s and Children’s Hospital, Xi’an,Shaanxi, China
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.