Tanja Wessels says an overwrapped coconut in a supermarket was the catalyst for one of the many bouts of eco-anxiety she has experienced. “I was paralysed and dumbstruck, a million ideas going through my mind – I felt really panicky. It was a feeling I experienced a lot when I’d enter a supermarket and see so much plastic in use,” says the Hong Kong-based South African, who gives public talks on the topic, one she says is gaining growing attention. According to a 2018 survey by the Hong Kong Playground Association, one in three young Hongkongers suffers from stress, anxiety or depression, while a 2016 study found more than one in 10 elderly people in Hong Kong displays signs of depression or even early symptoms of suicidal behaviour. Like most places, the city has no data directly linking anxiety to stress about environmental issues. Eco-anxiety is not listed in the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, considered the gold standard for mental health assessment. The main research on the subject was a 2017 report by the American Psychological Association, which collaborated with environmental charity ecoAmerica to release Climate Change’s Toll On Mental Health , a study looking at the impact climate change can have on the human psyche. Susan Clayton, professor of psychology and environmental studies at the College of Wooster, Ohio, and co-author of the report says: “We can say that a significant proportion of people are experiencing stress and worry about the potential impacts of climate change, and that the level of worry is almost certainly increasing.” Wessels, 45, says levels of eco-anxiety vary greatly, the worst being stress and depression after large-scale natural disasters such as hurricanes or floods in which lives and homes have been lost. However, of increasing significance, she says, is a “slower, quieter murmur in the background that’s not about losing your home, but about the waste and information overload”. The saturation of media reports on issues such as climate change and plastic pollution, accompanied by images of smoke-spewing coal stacks, polar bears stranded on tiny pieces of ice and waves of plastic washing up on beaches, plays a big role in feeding anxiety about environmental problems. In February this year, an academic paper on climate change went viral because its predictions were so grim; it was reported to have sent people into therapy. Another report that caused alarm came in 2018, when the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicted the human population could see a major environmental catastrophe, such as massive famine and wildfires, as early as 2040. Earlier this month, another report made global headlines – a study led by researchers at the University of Newcastle in Australia, and commissioned by the global conservation body WWF, which found that we are consuming around five grams of microplastics each week (about the same weight as a credit card). Instead of getting stressed and frustrated about environmental doom and gloom, Wessels recommends people get proactive. “Join community groups so you can share ideas about sustainability and help find solutions to environmental problems,” says Wessels, one of the founders of Circular Community Hong Kong, a group that unites individuals from industries such as fashion, design and art to help fight the war on waste. Wessels says her coping mechanisms come not just from aligning herself with like-minded people, but through art. She is a regular collaborator with British-born, Hong Kong-based photographer Alex Macro, and the pair host photo exhibitions around the city (last week they showed at co-working zone Spaces in Lee Garden Three in Causeway Bay). The pair created fashion shoots with collected plastic waste. As a follower of the zero waste movement, Wessels has also refrained from buying new clothes for the past two years, her protest against the fashion industry, the second-biggest polluter in the world. According to Greenpeace, more than 80 billion pieces of clothing are produced worldwide each year. But after a short time, three out of four garments end up in landfills or incinerated. Only a quarter will be recycled. “When I go into a place like [Spanish fast fashion retailer] Zara, usually for the air con, I don’t see racks and racks of cheap and fun and harmless wardrobe pieces. What I see is racks of textiles and dyes. It makes me feel very panicky. “I also think about all the work that went into those clothes, not just the human cost but the cost to the planet. I also wonder where it will all end up.” And her concern is real. Every day, Hong Kong sends 15,500 tonnes of waste to the city’s landfills, according to a 2017 Environmental Protection Department report. As a statement on the food industry, Wessels and Macro saved up plastic used on packaged food from a supermarket for a week, wrapped it into a ball, and dragged it through the city’s Central business district as part of Earth Day activities in April, 2018. “I got a lot of stares,” Wessels says with a laugh. “I looked like a dung beetle.” Such creative processes are cathartic for Wessels, helping her deal with her climate-change-induced anxiety – and raise awareness in the process. “A friend told me the other day that his children had not seen a beach without plastic – now that’s sad.”