Ireland's inadequate mental health service is straining under the pressure caused by the Covid-19 pandemic according to the Mental Health Reform.
The group are due to appear before the Oireachtas Sub-Committee on Mental Health today and will highlight current waiting times and staff shortages with the sector.
Over 2,000 children are now waiting for their first appointment with the child and adolescent mental health service, while the group also claims the service is 40 per cent under-staffed.
Psychiatry professor Brendan Kelly, from Trinity College Dublin, says getting the help needed has become more difficult due to the pandemic.
"A lot of mental health services are now done by telephone or remotely now, and while this works to a very good extend, face-to-face contact is generally best."
Prof Kelly adds: "We see a general increase in anxiety in the population. This is not mental illness. This is a very understandable reaction to the pandemic.
"But another thing we are seeing is people with mental illnesses, like Schizophrenia and Bi-Polar Disorder, are finding it difficult.
"They are having relapses and some of them are becoming more severely ill than they did during previous relapses at other times."
