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ArticleOpen Access http://dx.doi.org/10.26855/er.2026.04.006

Silent Emergency: A Desk Review of the Escalating Mental Health Crisis Among Ugandan Adolescents (2021-2026)

Josephine Ssirimuzaawo1,*, Miph Musoke2

1Department of Educational Psychology, School of Education, Nkumba University, Entebbe, P.O. Box 237, Uganda.

2Department of Epidemiology, School of Science, Nkumba University, Entebbe, P.O. Box 237, Uganda.

*Corresponding author: Josephine Ssirimuzaawo

Published: April 19, 2026

Abstract

Uganda’s adolescent population (ages 10-19) is experiencing a “Silent Emergency,” a rapid escalation of mental health disorders that remain largely invisible in national health and education discourse. Following the world’s longest nationwide COVID-19 school closure (22 months), the psychological landscape has shifted from localized stress to a systemic crisis affecting school-going and out-of-school youth alike. This desk review evaluates the prevalence, drivers, and systemic barriers to mental health care among Ugandan adolescents between 2021 and 2026, focusing on how policy on paper has so far failed to translate into effective school-based and community-based interventions. A qualitative desk review was conducted, synthesizing 30 sources published between 2021 and 2026, including peer-reviewed journal articles, NGO/UN reports, and Uganda specific policy documents from the Ministry of Health (MoH), National Planning Authority (NPA), and Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS). Data were thematically coded under four pillars: prevalence, etiology, cultural systemic barriers, and policy-implementation gaps. Depression and anxiety have surged to approximately 21.5% among out-of-school adolescents in urban settings like Kampala, compared to 14.0% among school-going peers. Key drivers include the “lockdown lag,” academic pressure, poverty, and gender-based violence. Despite existing frameworks, chronic underfunding and a shortage of trained professionals persist as major implementation gaps. To address this “Silent Emergency,” Uganda must integrate mental health literacy into the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC), decentralize care through school linked services, and treat adolescent mental health as a cross-sectoral priority.

Keyword

Adolescent mental health; Uganda; post-pandemic; school-based stress; mental health policy; 2021-2026

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Copyright

© 2026 by the author(s).
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) license, which permits non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not modified or adapted.
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

How to cite this paper

Silent Emergency: A Desk Review of the Escalating Mental Health Crisis Among Ugandan Adolescents (2021-2026)

How to cite this paper: Josephine Ssirimuzaawo, Miph Musoke. (2026). Silent Emergency: A Desk Review of the Escalating Mental Health Crisis Among Ugandan Adolescents (2021-2026)The Educational Review, USA10(4), 217-227.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.26855/er.2026.04.006