One in six women suffers from depression after childbirth

The postpartum period is one of the most stressful in a mother’s life. But it is also a moment of great vulnerability, which can be accompanied by real psychological suffering. For the first time in France, researchers studied mothers’ mental health two months after giving birth. Their work, published in Weekly Epidemiological Bulletinshow that an average of 16.7% suffer from postpartum depression (PPD), that more than a quarter suffer from anxiety and that one in twenty women experience suicidal ideation in the first months after giving birth.

A team led by Nolwenn Regnault, head of the perinatal, early childhood and mental health department of the French Public Health Service, worked on data collected during the latest National Perinatal Survey (ENP) in 2021. This large-scale study is conducted every five to five years. six years on a representative sample of women who gave birth in France during the same period…