“+25% since 2010” refers to a change in estimated global prevalence of anxiety disorders over time.
A few important details sit behind that number:
- What “prevalence” means: the share of a population living with an anxiety disorder during a given year (commonly expressed as a percentage per 100 people).
- Where the estimate comes from: widely cited global time-trend charts are typically based on IHME’s Global Burden of Disease (GBD) modeling, as presented by Our World in Data.
- Why it’s an estimate, not a headcount: GBD combines many data sources (surveys, studies, health records where available) and uses statistical models to fill gaps and make countries comparable. That helps with global coverage, but it also means there’s uncertainty.
It’s also worth keeping in mind that “anxiety disorder” is a clinical category (e.g., generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, social anxiety disorder). National agencies such as NIMH publish U.S.-specific statistics based on large surveys, which may not be directly comparable to GBD global estimates.
Sources
- https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/anxiety-disorders-prevalence
- https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165032724020743
- https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s43045-023-00315-3
- https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/any-anxiety-disorder
- https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/explore-mental-health/statistics/anxiety-statistics
