ACT human rights commissioner Jodie Griffiths-Cook has raised concerns over the adequacy of proposed bed numbers for adolescents suffering acute mental-health problems.
Part of the Centenary Hospital expansion, the Adolescent Mental Health Unit will include six dedicated beds for five-to-17-year-olds and two flex beds, when it opens in 2022.
At present, the ACT does not have designated acute mental health beds for young people aged 5-17.
This year, increased presentations of 15-to-17-year-olds seeking mental health services has put additional strain on the Adult Mental Health Units.
Ms Cook said the capacity was based on modelling for the ACT population, without accounting for surrounding areas of NSW.
"Cross-border demand needs to be factored in," Ms Cook said.
"Children and young people are often left to navigate an adult-centric service system, finding it difficult to get help.
"Young clients whom we advocate for tell us about the challenges of being admitted to the adult unit, including feeling unsafe amongst adults who are acutely unwell."
ACT Mental Health Minister Shane Rattenbury said the directorate's modelling based off national population data suggested eight beds would be adequate for over a decade.
"In mental health there tends to not be as much cross-border use of facilities as we might see in other areas of health. There is more emphasis on people staying in NSW," Mr Rattenbury said.
Mr Rattenbury said the new adolescent health unit was designed around a short-short stay model.
"It's not a long-term admission to hospital, it's a limited intervention which then seeks to move people back into the family environment where possible but with intensive outreach support," he said.
ACT consumer health network's Bianca Rossetti said her major concern was how long the public would continue to wait before the unit was operational.
"There's nothing currently in place and with a pandemic going on - that's a real problem," she said.
Lifeline experienced a spike in calls from December 1 amid Australia's worst bushfire season which never abated. It was now receiving 25 per cent more calls than it normally would at this time of year - an unprecedented amount in its 57-year history.
Canberrans called Lifeline more than 1600 times in July 2019. That jumped to more than 2100 in July 2020.
Ms Rossetti would like to see more funding go towards prevention rather than dealing with mental health issues only when they became a crisis.
She said young people were being turned away from emergency wards because they had not demonstrated suicidal tendencies.
"I've often heard of these people going home and thinking 'well what am I going to do? Do I do these suicidal idealisations to get support'?" Ms Rossetti said.
"The kids say, 'we go to the school counselor, she's busy, we go to the school nurse, she's busy, we ring up help lines and they say we'll call you back'. It's just that continuous rejection that then they go, 'ah well, no one's going to help me, why should I try to get that help'?"
