From these numbers it appears that the USA has a massive and GROWING mental health crisis. In the first three years they averaged about 5 million/yr contacts and by early 2025 it had increased to 600,000/month (7.2 million ) on a annual basis. Be sure to open this link to a breakdown of people/kids <24 y/o.
IMO, since addiction has a substantial underlying mental health issues, these numbers could be extrapolated to the number of potential people dealing with substance abuse issues. Maybe being a kid in the 50’s & 60’s wasn’t all that hard. Maybe these kids just need 12 yrs of parochial school with NUNS. You “toed the line – or else”!
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2837598
The US launched the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline in July 2022 following a rise in youth suicide rates. In the 3 years since transitioning from a 10-digit number to an easier-to-remember 3-digit number, usage has steadily increased. To date, the free service—which connects users to a network of more than 200 call centers that provide crisis counseling and referrals—has received 16.5 million contacts, including 11.1 million calls, 2.9 million texts, and 2.4 million chats. Monthly contacts have doubled from approximately 300 000 in May 2022 to 600 000 in early 2025, according to KFF, a nonprofit organization focused on health policy.
It’s too soon to fully determine 988’s effect on suicide prevention, KFF stated. Public awareness of the service was initially low, and the overall number of suicide deaths remained stable from 2022 to 2023, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But the crisis number’s growing contact volume suggests improved recognition.
Although the US Health and Human Services budget proposes maintaining current 988 funding levels, the federal government recently eliminated the specialized 988 service for LGBTQ+ youth, which handled about 10% of all crisis line contacts. Additional cuts to Medicaid and other programs may lead states to reduce spending on behavioral health services, KFF reported.
Filed under: General Problems
One of the projects I worked on at CIAAG was to data mine overdose, unintentional OD and suicide (drug related) for each individual state from 2009 to 2019. While researching I found there was a 7 yr period in the CDC data base that was missing and 4 FOIA requests were met with silence
The CDC is a strange beast. I found a link on their website disclosing that for each drug found in a decedent’s system was counted as a separate death. i.e. 1 body, 4 drugs=4 deaths according to their “math”.