Doctors in Ireland have called on the government to ban “overwhelmingly destructive” smartphones for all children under the age of 16.
The Irish Medical Organisation (IMO) said young people’s social media usage should be treated as a “public health emergency” by ministers.
Prof Matthew Sadlier, the IMO chairman of the consultants’ committee, said: “Our young people are exposed to a toxic mix of both extraordinarily harmful content and social media platforms that use features such as infinite scroll to promote more user activity, creating a vicious circle of use which ultimately leads to higher levels of anxiety, depression, loneliness and suicidal tendencies.”
The call for an outright ban in Ireland comes after European countries such as France, Italy, the Netherlands and Finland tightened or planned to toughen up restrictions on smartphones in schools.
In England, schools have been given government advice to stop the use of mobile phones during the school day and there are long-standing concerns over the impact of social media on young people’s mental health.
‘Time to get serious’
Ireland’s trade union for doctors is supporting calls by Stephen Donnelly, the minister for health, to ban smartphones for children and teenagers and Norma Foley, the minister for education, for a ban on mobile phones in schools.
Prof Sadlier said every indicator of mental health for teenagers and young adults had worsened since 2012, when social media became widely popular.
He said Ireland was successful in reducing smoking after big public health campaigns in the past and could do the same with social media and smartphones.
“It is time to get serious with smartphone makers and social media companies,” he told The Irish Times.
“It is not enough to ask parents to shoulder this responsibility alone; the Government can and must intervene in order to level the playing field for all young people.”
Many US tech giants have their European headquarters in Ireland because of its low corporate tax rate. They include social media titan Meta, formerly called Facebook, which also owns Instagram.
France will impose a complete ban on the use of mobile phones in 200 schools as part of a trial to tackle “hyper-connectivity”, which will be rolled out across the whole country if it is successful.
It follows the findings of a report commissioned by Emmanuel Macron, the French president, in June, which warned of the dangers of excess screen time – or “hyper-connectivity” – among children.
The addiction can cause health problems including sleep deprivation, obesity, depression, anxiety, addiction, cyber bullying and suicide, the report, entitled In Search of Lost Time, said.
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