In 2025, Bris had 62,935 supportive conversations with children. The most common causes are still mental illness, family and family conflicts, but in this year's report, Bris focuses on economic vulnerability and violence and lack of care in the home environment.
Conversations about violence have increased. When it comes to financial vulnerability, it's not the most common thing children contact us about, but it's still almost five conversations a week, says Frisk.
Adult responsibility
When children contact Bris about financial vulnerability, it may be a fear of losing their home or losing their social context - perhaps school - where their friends are.
Maria Frisk says that children often have a strong drive to change the situation themselves. This may involve working on holidays and weekends or taking on a lot of responsibility for siblings so that their parents can work. The majority of those Bris speaks to earn money legally, she emphasizes.
But we also meet children who talk about illegal and destructive ways to get money. This can involve stealing to get food, more serious criminal acts, and selling sex.
Physical violence
The number of calls about violence, abuse and violations amounted to almost 10,000 last year - calls about physical violence alone averaged just over nine a day.
Most often it is the child's parent or foster parent who exposes the child to violence, Frisk says.
Many say it involved physical violence when they were young, but it often shifts to psychological violence as they get older.
"I'm trying to manage on my own, but it's not going very well. I'm just a child," says one child, according to the report.
Maria Frisk says the quote is an example of adults' lack of responsibility.
The right support is needed at the right time. Unfortunately, children too rarely receive it and support based on their needs. When society fails and we adults fail, children have to bear the consequences both here and now and also in the long term.
Calls to Bris have doubled since 2020. The largest annual increase occurred between 2020 and 2021, as a result of increased availability.
Among the most common themes in children's conversations with Bris in 2025 were (1) mental health, (2) family and family conflicts, (3) violence, abuse and violations, (4) school, (5) friends.
Source: Bris
