New advisory about Mental Health and the Pandemic
A recent report published by the US Surgeon General outlines the impact of the pandemic on youth mental health, and also makes some recommendations to address some of these concerns. To read the entire report, click here, but I will summarize the report in this newsletter.
Since the pandemic began, rates of anxiety and depression have doubled. Emergency room visits were up 51% in the beginning of 2021 for adolescent girls for suspected suicide attempts. The lack of in-person connections with friends, teachers, and community members made it more difficult to observe concerning behaviors that may have been addressed prior to these attempts. However, good news is that preliminary research does not show a significant increase in completed suicides, I would like to note, however, that mental illness is a cumulative effect of social, physical, chemical and environmental factors so "getting back to normal" does not make the effects of this pandemic go away. In fact, returning to pre-pandemic activity can increase stress for many and exacerbate any mental health concerns already present.
Some of the factors that increase the risk for mental illness in youth include:
Prior mental health challenges..
Living in urban areas with higher COVID-19 rates.
Living with caregivers who are frontline workers.
Disrupted routines.
Experiencing Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) such as abuse or neglect.
Financial, food or housing insecurity.
The death of a family member.
The report also noted that certain communities were also at higher risk, including racial and ethnic minority groups, LGBTQ+ youth, and immigrants. One of the reason that these groups of youth are at higher risk include systemic racism in the medical and mental health systems, making them more hesitant to access these services.
But there is good news too! Not only did the report find that many young people were quite resilient during the pandemic, but the increase awareness about the need has created a call to action that more people are taking seriously. Among several recommendations, the Surgeon General reinforced the need that schools must be part of the solution for good, culturally competent mental health care. This only underscores the important work that Inner Harbor is doing, and it feels good to be part of the solution.