Number of UK officers signed off due to depression and anxiety passes 17,700

The number of UK police officers signed off work due to stress, depression, anxiety or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) has reached a staggering 17,752 officers.

A Freedom of Information request to 47 forces found that the number of officers signed off for mental health issues went up 22% in the financial year 2024-2025.

This is the fourth year in a row that the number has gone up, and it is a huge 182% higher than when Police Oracle first ran the survey 12 years ago – in 2012-13, 6,294 officers were signed off for poor mental health.

Of the 45 forces that provided figures both this year and last year, 33 reported an increased number of officers being signed off for mental health reasons.

The highest number of absences were, unsurprisingly, reported by the UK’s largest police forces: the Metropolitan Police (2,054), Police Scotland (1,203), Greater Manchester Police (1,050) and West Midlands Police (1,162).

Among the forces reporting high percentage rises in mental health absences are the City of London (up a huge 430% but starting from a low base), Devon & Cornwall (up 193%) and Northamptonshire (up 100%).

The Metropolitan Police’s figure has also gone up substantially in the past year, but the force’s reporting has historically been erratic, so it is difficult to compare like with like.

Police Oracle publishes these figures today (21 July) as Oscar Kilo – the Police Wellbeing service – launches a new Mental Health Crisis Line for police officers and staff across England and Wales.

The huge rise in police officers taking time off for mental ill health are supported by the fact that 81% of respondents told the latest Police Federation of England and Wales Pay and Morale Survey that they had experienced feelings of stress, low mood, anxiety or other difficulties with their health and wellbeing over the past 12 months.

Of those people, 93% said their feelings had been caused, or made worse, by work, with ‘workload being too high’ (60%) and ‘having a poor work/life balance’ (51%) being cited as the most common reasons.

PFEW’s Wellbeing Lead, Paul Williams, said that rising absences for mental health reasons were “very worrying”. He said: “Behind each mental health condition, you’ve got an individual who’s going through incredible trauma, which has a significant impact not just on them, but on their family, marriage and career. It can be devastating.”

Paul said the figures were “a demonstration of the complexities of policing, a demonstration of the budget cuts over the past 15 years, and the lack of increase in pay for police officers. All this has contributed to an extreme rise in mental ill health within the police, and it’s only going to keep rising if there’s no intervention”.

There was “absolutely not enough being done” about officers’ poor mental health, said Paul: “We are trying our best via the Police Covenant, which has no budget. We’re trying our best with police forces, which have no budget. The impact of the Spending Review means that this will get worse. Forces just cannot afford to provide welfare practices for police officers when they cannot even fund the service and have to make cuts.”

As a result, Paul fears there will be “an exodus in policing”. He said: “Cops will be leaving because they’re rightfully putting their health before a job that, at the moment, is becoming torturous.” It is estimated that, by the year 2027, 10,000 officers a year could leave the police service.

Paul added that the number of suicides among police officers and staff was an urgent concern, and called on forces to start recording the number of officers who take their own lives and the possible reasons behind it, because there is currently no mandate to do this.

This is one of the aims of the Federation-led STEP (Suicide Trauma Education Prevention) campaign, which is also calling for police officers who have attended a suicide-related incident in their job to attend a mandatory TRiM session to get support from the force.

Spencer Wragg, Chair of Hampshire Police Federation, who is behind the STEP campaign said: “We need to encourage our colleagues to seek help when they need it. They need to look past that professional pride and superhero masking when in times of crisis and reach out to, it doesn’t matter who to. All of us would much rather help a friend or colleague in times of need rather than attend their funeral.

“Six years ago, I came very close to taking my own life. I didn’t phone anybody, I didn’t reach out for help, in fact I took steps to make sure no one could intervene. Had I not made that last-second decision to change my mind, then there would have been nobody who could have stopped me taking my life.

“I share my own personal experience of near suicide, because if I can make a difference to just one person – and I may never know who that person is or what the difference was – then that’s a success for me.”

Andy Rhodes, Director of the National Police Wellbeing Service Oscar Kilo, said: “Catching mental illness before it escalates and addressing the issues that are causing things like work-related stress is of paramount importance.”

Policing is a high-stress profession, he said, with high levels of trauma exposure, demand and pressure, and the fact that so many officers are reporting sick means “we all must do more to prioritise and invest in prevention”.

But Andy also welcomed the fact that increasing numbers of officers felt able to speak up about their mental health, as he said that “traditionally, policing has suffered from a ‘be strong’ culture”.

Andy continued: “Every force is working hard to invest in good-quality, timely support, and new standards and guidance are in place to drive consistency in areas like occupational health, suicide prevention, fatigue and trauma support – which is included in the inspection process.

“The National Police Wellbeing Service is now a well-established national capability providing physical assets, training courses and advice to thousands of officers and staff every year – and this year we will be launching a police-only mental health crisis hotline.

“We recognise that it is not only the nature of police work that affects mental health; it is also affected by things such as insufficient resource, high demand and constant change, which needs to be addressed as an urgent priority at a local and national level.”