Children: Experts call for banning screens, which are very harmful, before the age of six

Tablets, TVs, computers, phones, video games: screens are harmful before the age of six because they "permanently affect the health and intellectual abilities" of children: health experts called Tuesday for a "collective awareness."

Introducing new advice for parents, the health record, which came into effect on January 1, stipulates "no screen time before the age of three," and recommends "occasional use, limited to educational content and accompanied by an adult" between "three and six years old." This health warning is the only recommendation from the Children and Screens report, produced a year ago by a commission of experts appointed by President Emmanuel Macron, to have come into effect since then.

At a time when researchers are not unanimous about the harmful effects of screens on children, the ten experts on this commission described social networks as "risk factors" for depression or anxiety in cases of "pre-existing vulnerability," deeming the level of exposure of children to pornographic and violent content "alarming."

In light of "recent knowledge," screens should be banned "before the age of six," wrote the five learned societies, including the French Society of Pediatrics and the Society of Public Health, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and Ophthalmology, on Tuesday in a column addressed to "young parents, teachers, educators, caregivers, and political decision-makers."

"In 2025, there is no longer any doubt, and numerous international scientific publications are there to remind us: neither screen technology nor its content, including supposedly educational content, is suitable for a small, developing brain," the signatories state.

Screens "do not meet the needs of children" and, "worse, they hinder and alter the development of their brain," warn learned societies. "Language delays, attention and memory problems, motor restlessness...": health professionals and teachers "are observing the damage caused by regular exposure to screens before entering primary school," they assure.

Because a child's neurodevelopment results from "rich and varied observations and interactions with the environment" for which "the first six years of life are fundamental." Defending themselves from wanting to "demonize digital tools and their use," they call on parents to "create an environment favorable to the child's health and development" with "alternative activities: reading aloud, games - free, board or outdoor -, physical, creative and artistic activities." While "all socio-educational environments are concerned," they emphasize that "exposures are higher in disadvantaged homes."

"We teachers can immediately see which child is on screen or not, in terms of behavior, agitation, and reasoning," Nathalie L., a primary school teacher in a village in the Drôme region, told AFP.

"I have a little girl who goes hiking and plays Monopoly with her family: her writing is full of imagination," she reports. To "capture the attention of students who are used to channel surfing," she has implemented "the flexible classroom: changing activities every fifteen minutes at most."

On Monday, the association Pas à Pas l'Enfant (Step by Step Child) deplored the fact that "no concrete action has been taken to avoid the health disaster predicted" by the report "Children and Screens." At the end of March, on France Inter, Servane Mouton, co-chair of the committee that drafted the report, pointed the finger at "industrialists, who are deploying a wealth of inventiveness and creativity" to create applications "that will make us spend as much time as possible" in front of screens.

"Politicians," she added, "are still struggling today to enforce regulations voted on at European level and to widely disseminate a discourse that is up to date with scientific knowledge."

On Tuesday, former Prime Minister Gabriel Attal and child psychiatrist Marcel Rufo published another column calling for a "state of emergency against screens" with "radical measures" to "save" adolescents from the harmful effects of social media: the creation of an "addict score," a "digital curfew," and an "assessment interview" on screen addiction in Year 6 and Year 10.

In November, Australia passed a law banning the use of social media for anyone under 16. Health Minister Catherine Vautrin "will speak on the subject of screens in the coming weeks," according to her office.