A new study of WA students has found an alarming rise in severe emotional distress.

A report has been produced based on the results of the DETECT Schools Study, which was set up to find COVID-19 in WA schools by testing staff and students.

The study — run by the Telethon Kids Institute and the WA Departments of Health and Education — included surveys of the impact of the pandemic on student, staff and parent wellbeing.

After polling more than 24,000 students across 79 public schools, it appears that 40 per cent of secondary students are experiencing moderate to high levels of emotional distress.

That proportion is about three times higher than a comparable benchmark of 14 per cent found in a national study in 2014.

A much higher proportion of female students — 45 per cent — reported experiencing emotional distress, compared with 28 per cent of male students surveyed.

The increase in adolescent mental health difficulties “may have been further exacerbated by COVID-19”, the report says, though the link requires further investigation.

About half of the student respondents reported COVID-19 had impacted them negatively, while the rest reported little or no impact on their daily lives.

Telethon Kids Institute Director Dr Jonathan Carapetis said COVID-19 has added to a situation that was already bad before the pandemic.

“The level of young people's distress and mental health problems was already on the rise,” he said.

“We suspect that COVID has had an additional impact, and we will only be able to track that over time to understand to what degree.

“This is not anything particularly surprising, but it is incredibly important we take note of it and we deal with it.”

Senior Vice-President at the State School Teachers' Union of WA, Matt Jarman, says the findings are concerning but not surprising. 

“COVID has really brought to everybody's attention that nature of the problems that we have, that have been growing over several years in our classrooms and our schools,” he told reporters.

“Stress levels of teachers are very high. The complexities of dealing with mental health has really increased workload.

“I think this data needs to be correlated to the paediatric mental health waiting lists that we see around Perth.”