General Mental Health Issues
- The health system in the U.S. is failing, a startling new report finds. The U.S. ranks as the worst performer among 10 developed nations in critical areas of health care, including preventing deaths, access (mainly because of high cost), and guaranteeing quality treatment for everyone regardless of gender, income, or geographic location, according to the report published by The Commonwealth Fund. The ongoing substance use crisis and the prevalence of gun violence in the U.S. contribute significantly to its poor outcomes, with more than 100,000 overdose deaths and 43,000 gun-related deaths in 2023. Read more here.
- St. Paul, Minnesota is dropping a program that's helped thousands of people in need. Mental health providers will no longer work with police to follow up on 911 calls to connect people in need to resources. The Community Outreach and Stabilization Unit, or COAST, handles about 1,700 cases a year. Read more here.
- Mississippi consistently ranks in the top five in the nation for its rates of antipsychotic drugging in nursing homes, data from the federal government shows. More than one in five nursing home residents in the United States is given powerful and mind-altering antipsychotic drugs. That’s more than 10 times the rate of the general population – despite the fact that the conditions antipsychotics treat do not become more common with age. In Mississippi, that goes up to one in four residents. Read more here.
Rural Mental Health Issues
- Farmers’ livelihoods are shaped by many factors beyond their control, from fluctuations in global markets to extreme weather that can derail an entire growing season. These stressors are contributing to a mental health crisis in agriculture. The suicide rate among male farmers and ranchers in the U.S. is about 60% higher than that of all working-age men, and farmers have higher rates of depression, anxiety, and suicide risk than the general population. Amid this crisis, efforts are growing to break down stigma and improve access to mental health supports. Read more here.
The Opioid Crisis and Addiction Issues
- For the first time in decades, public health data shows a sudden and hopeful drop in drug overdose deaths across the U.S. National surveys compiled by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention already show an unprecedented decline in drug deaths of roughly 10.6 percent. That's a huge reversal from recent years when fatal overdoses regularly increased by double-digit percentages. Read more here.
- The fentanyl crisis has brought a terrifying irony to the American high school experience: the number of young people dying of overdoses is on the rise, even as teens today are far less likely to use drugs than previous generations. A 2024 study found that drug-related death rates among 14- to 18-year-olds doubled between 2019 and 2022, killing more than 3,000 teens over three years. However, the study found that in 2022, only 8% of high school seniors reported having used an illicit drug other than cannabis in the previous year, compared with 21% two decades earlier. Read more here.
- As of Sept. 12, more than 25 million Americans – including 1.9 million Floridians – had lost Medicaid coverage since the expiration of federal pandemic protections, which kept people continually enrolled until March 2023. Research shows that when taken as prescribed, medications for opioid use disorder — such as methadone and a similar medicine, buprenorphine — can reduce dangerous drug use and cut overdose fatalities by more than half. Other studies find the risk of overdose and death increases when such treatment is interrupted. Read more here.
Climate Change and Mental Health
- National mortality figures kept by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention do not track post-disaster suicides. That means there is no reliable way to monitor the problem nationally, despite the fact that local journalists and researchers have both found evidence that despair and suicide spike after major disasters. Read more here.
- As climate change starts baking Colorado more, it’s set to lead to droughts, heat waves, and more wildfires. That’s going to mean smoke in the skies, polluting the air. Researchers are raising concerns about what that bad air does to your health. A new CU Boulder study adds to the list of likely problems. It found exposure to air pollution, including wildfire smoke, increases symptoms of mental illness in young people. Read more here.
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