The biennial youth mental health report from Mission Australia and the Black Dog Institute found rates of distress across the nation had increased from 18.6 per cent in 2012 to 26.8 per cent in 2020.

However, the ACT appeared to buck the trend with a decline from almost one in three people reporting mental distress in 2012 to 19.9 per cent in the 2020 survey.

Girls, Indigenous youth, people with a disability and non-binary people reported higher levels of psychological distress.

Mission Australia chief executive James Toomey said young people faced barriers to receiving treatment for mental health concerns, such as long wait times and high upfront treatment costs.

"Our young people need different services and responses than adults for issues about psychological distress and then within that group of young people we need to be getting better at customising our responses to particular segments of that population," Mr Toomey said.

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The survey data was collected between April and August 2020 when the majority of the country was under COVID-19 restrictions, but the results showed no significant difference from the 2019 survey.

In the ACT, 29 per cent of female respondents experienced psychological distress, compared to 13.3 percent of males and 31.6 per cent of non-binary respondents.

Thirty-four per cent of Indigenous people aged 15 to 19 years in the ACT were in distress while 31.3 per cent of people with a disability were affected.

Mr Toomey said it was important for parents, teachers, peers and employers to recognise the signs and symptoms of mental ill-health in young people to be able to treat problems early.

"What we know is that 75 per cent of the mental health issues that show up in in adults actually have commenced in before people are 25," he said.

"Early intervention is incredibly important."

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