Stress is a word which means different things to different people. For some it represents feelings of inadequacy and hopelessness. For others – a fortunate few – stress is positive, a mark of pushing against self-imposed limits to achieve challenges. Either way, it affects people’s lives deeply.

According to the Department of Health and Social Care, tackling stress through positive mental health support "not only improves our lives as individuals, but makes good business sense. Failure to adequately support the workforce is costing our economy up to £99bn per year.”

What are we to make then of a major new study commissioned by the Mental Health Foundation? This research, based upon an unusually large sample of the population, revealed unprecedented levels of stress amongst all sections of society.

Three in four Britons have been so stressed at least once over the last year that they have felt overwhelmed or unable to cope. Worse still, one in three people have been left feeling suicidal, and one in six have self-harmed as a direct result.

Of course, statistics rarely reveal the true human cost of stress or, indeed, any mental health problem. And it is a strange fact that while people feel comfortable talking about their physical ailments, many are ashamed of what they see as mental weakness.

As Isabella Goldie, director of the Mental Health Foundation (MHF) thinktank, has pointed out, this contradiction should set off alarm bells: “Millions around the UK are experiencing high levels of stress and it is damaging our health. Stress is one of the great public health challenges of our time but is not being taken as seriously as physical health concerns.”

According to the research, young adults are the age group most vulnerable to stress. Overall, 83 per cent of 18 to 24-year-olds said they had been left overwhelmed, suicidal or unable to cope, far more than those aged 55 or over (65 per cent).

The report from the MHF concluded: “Chronic or long-term stress can affect sleep, memory and eating habits and increase the risk of irritable bowel syndrome, stomach ulcers and heart disease. Significant minorities respond by over-eating, drinking, taking drugs or smoking.”

It also warned of stress leading to anxiety, depression and relapses of schizophrenia, especially among people living in poverty and social isolation, in minority communities, or those suffering long-term disability and health problems. Add to the mix the millions in low pay austerity Britain who suffer money and housing troubles or stress at work and it is not hard to see how the problem leads to anxiety or depression.

None of these problems are without remedies with the necessary political will. Sadly, according to the Royal College of Psychiatrists, the total amount of income mental health trusts in England received in 2016-17 was £105m lower than in 2011-12, taking into account inflation and real costs.

How many of us have not experienced mental health issues or known others – friends, family, colleagues – who have joined the one-in-four receiving treatment for such problems at some point in their lives?

Hamlet, in Shakespeare’s play of that name, tells us “there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” Mental illness can distort thought processes terribly, as anyone who has suffered from depression knows all too well.

So much of human happiness depends on habits of seeing and thinking, assumptions taught by our childhoods and reinforced by day to day experience, whether happy or negative. In short, our perception of the world largely determines our sense of wellbeing.

All the more reason for a civilised, decent, compassionate society to invest heavily in its mental health services to prevent needless misery. Politicians who fail to pass that test are unworthy of their profession.

But I would go further. It seems logical that people will feel anxious and insecure in a world of job and housing insecurity where the safety net of the welfare state has been deliberately stripped away. To truly address stress we need to confront the toxic inequalities in modern Britain.