Denmark Sucks, is this is one big unhappy and depressed country?
Previously, a survey from The university of Leicester came up with the idea that Denmark is the "happiest place on earth". This came as a bit of a surprise to me, seeing as how Denmark is the country that ranks some of the highest in terms of suiciderates, mental illness and depression.
https://www.sst.dk/publ/tidsskrifter/vital/2001/vital01_04/kap13.htm
This new evidence from The National Healthservice of Denmark ( Sundhedsstyrelsen ) shows that once in a lifetime 600.000 people in Denmark will suffer from depression. That is out of a small population of 5,5million people. Something is not quite right in the State of Denmark.
Taken straight from the article:
"Man skønner, at der i Danmark er 200.000 voksne - eller fire til fem procent af den voksne befolkning – som til enhver tid lider af depression. Ca. dobbelt så mange har haft en depression inden for det seneste år. I alt regner man med, at 600.000 danskere får en depression i løbet af deres liv."
Translated directly into English.
https://www.translate.google.com
"It is estimated that in Denmark there are 200,000 adults - or four to five per cent of the adult population - who at any time suffer from depression. Approximately twice as many had depression within the past year. In total it is estimated that 600,000 Danes have a depression during their lives."
Additionaly, two new surveys from OECD, showed that Denmark ranks high in terms of mental illness.
https://www.dr.dk/Nyheder/Andre_sprog/English/2011/02/14/132407.htm
Danes are mentally worn out
14. feb. 2011 14.06 English
Denmark is the country in the world where most citizens have to leave the labor market because of mental illnesses.
This discouraging fact is evident from a new comprehensive OECD-report, writes Berlingske.
The report reveals that when four Danes were approved for incapacity benefits or a flex job in 1995, the reason was mental illness in one out of four cases. Today every other person has a mental illness.
This makes Denmark the global front-runner of an international trend where more and more workers find themselves bedbound due to mental illness.
https://www.dr.dk/Nyheder/Andre_sprog/English/2011/01/18/134039.htm
Denmark has most mentally ill pensioners
18. jan. 2011 14.45 English
Schizophrenia, severe anxiety, depression and other mental disorders cause more people to retire due to disability than before.
In 1999, one in four new disability pensioners suffered from a mental disorder, a statistics that had Denmark rank sixth compared to other OECD countries.
Every other pensioner is affected
Nine years later, the survey showed a different picture.
In 2008, close to every other Danish disability pensioner suffered from a mental disorder, the highest share in all of the OECD, according to Local Government Denmark’s newsletter Momentum.
The number of new disability pensioners each year has also increased, just as the total number has swelled, with some 250,000 Danes receiving disability benefits today.
The employers’ responsibility
Vilhelm Borg, Senior Researcher at the National Research Centre for the Working Environment, thinks that society should be far more cautious in placing people on permanent disability benefits.
- As a rule, the employers should do far more to retain mentally vulnerable employees by modifying the work for when they go through a difficult patch, he says to Momentum.
He thinks that the Danish top spot in the OECD survey may be a result of the custom in other countries of relatives providing for and nursing the mentally ill at home.
This is well backed up by the fact that Denmark is ranked relatively high in terms of suiciderates.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_rate
This leaves me with the question: With mental illness,depressionrates and suiciderates in Denmark being high, was this whole idea of "Happy Denmark" one big illusion, or was it made purely and solely for tourism purposes?
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