Declining mental health in Canada has a specific number attached to it now. Statistics Canada measured how many people reported feeling happy and interested in life. In 2015 it was 78 percent. By 2024 it had fallen to 61 percent. That is not a small shift. One in five Canadians was struggling with emotional health a decade ago. Now it is two in five.

What does it feel like to realize that the things that feel personal, the anxiety, the low-grade exhaustion, the difficulty trusting people around you, are actually part of a measurable national pattern? Dr. Perry Adler names the contributors plainly: a pandemic that isolated people at exactly the wrong developmental moment, economic pressure that did not stop when the lockdowns did, geopolitical stress, social media, and bodies that stopped moving.

Grace is the word that sits underneath all of it. Compassion for yourself and for the person beside you. The capacity to imagine the other. Dr. Perry Adler says we are losing it, and the way back starts with asking how are you and actually waiting for the answer.

Topics: declining mental health Canada, Statistics Canada functional health 2024, pandemic psychological impact, social media emotional health, grace and compassion

GUEST: Dr. Perry Adler

Originally aired on2026-03-27