Mental health in South Korea

Over the past few decades, mental health has become an increasingly serious issue in health in South Korea. A 2021 survey conducted by the Ministry of Health and Welfare found that 32.7% of males and 22.9% of females in South Korea developed symptoms of mental illness at least one time in their lives.^[1] Suicide in South Korea is the most frequent cause of death for people aged 9 to 24.^[1] Mental health issues are most common among the elderly and adolescents.^[2][3]

Since the late 1990s, South Korea has been enacting policies to address societal mental health challenges. These efforts increased into the late 2000s and 2010s, but a number of studies have suggested they have not significantly reduced the prevalence of such concerns. One significant challenge is that these efforts are consistently found to be underutilized. A number of proposed explanations exist for this underutilization, including societal stigma due to Korean Confucianist concerns over losing face, lack of understanding about the symptoms of mental illness, and low awareness of what resources are available.