More than one-third of Americans live in designated Mental Health Professional Shortage Areas, communities that have fewer mental health providers than the minimum their level of population would need. The President is announcing a national mental health strategy to strengthen system capacity, connect more Americans to care, and create a continuum of support –transforming our health and social services infrastructure to address mental health holistically and equitably.Īt the center of our national mental health crisis is a severe shortage of behavioral health providers. Now, far more is needed to ensure that everyone who needs help can access care when and where they seek it.
The American Rescue Plan laid the groundwork, providing critical investments to expand access to mental health services. President Biden is laying out a vision to transform how mental health is understood, perceived, accessed, treated, and integrated – in and out of health care settings. As the Surgeon-General has said, “when not deployed responsibly and safely, these tools can pit us against each other, reinforce negative behaviors like bullying and exclusion, and undermine the safe and supportive environments young people need and deserve.” In the State of the Union, the President will call on Congress to strengthen privacy protections, ban targeted advertising to children, and demand technology companies stop collecting personal data on our children. While technology platforms have improved our lives in some ways, there is mounting evidence that social media is harmful to many kids’ and teens’ mental health, well-being, and development. This youth mental health crisis has been accentuated by large social media platforms, which for years have been conducting a national experiment on our children and using their data to keep them clicking-with enormous consequences. Emergency department visits for attempted suicide have risen 51 percent among adolescent girls. In 2019, one in three high school students and half of female students reported persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness, an overall increase of 40 percent from 2009.
An early study has found that students are about five months behind in math and four months behind in reading, compared with students prior to the pandemic. More than half of parents express concern over their children’s mental well-being. Our youth have been particularly impacted as losses from COVID and disruptions in routines and relationships have led to increased social isolation, anxiety, and learning loss. But the grief, trauma, and physical isolation of the last two years have driven Americans to a breaking point. Even before the pandemic, rates of depression and anxiety were inching higher. And, Black and Brown communities are disproportionately undertreated – even as their burden of mental illness has continued to rise. Two out of five adults report symptoms of anxiety or depression. Our country faces an unprecedented mental health crisis among people of all ages. As part of this unity agenda, he will announce a strategy to address our national mental health crisis. In his first State of the Union, the President will outline a unity agenda consisting of policy where there has historically been support from both Republicans and Democrats, and call on Congress to send bills to his desk to deliver progress for the American people.