Our Mental Health and Addiction Crisis is its Own National Tragedy
Pain in our nation persists beyond today’s headlines
It’s frustrating that mental health never – I repeat, never – gets more attention than it does in the immediate aftermath of a preventable tragedy. In fact, Media Matters recently shared a Tweet showing how Fox News’ on-air mentions of mental health over the years have spiked significantly whenever there was a mass shooting.
We’re seeing this familiar trend continue in the aftermath of the Uvalde, Texas elementary school shooting, as politicians opine on the mental state of the teenage killer. Just ten days before the Uvalde shooting, America was similarly transfixed by a racially motivated shooting spree at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York that killed ten Black people. And even as I write this, the news cycle is already shifting to cover yet another shooting, this time at a Tulsa, Oklahoma hospital that left four people dead. I shudder to think how much focus will be placed on the Tulsa gunman’s mental health in the coming weeks (and how little will be placed on his legally purchased AR-15 assault rifle).
Unfortunately, the mental health discussion never lasts the way it should in these instances, and people are quick to offer thoughts and prayers, then move on to whatever’s next in the news cycle. The problems, however, still remain, and millions of Americans are left to suffer just out of sight. We are at risk of becoming desensitized to the things that are most precious, most important.
For the past five years, Well Being Trust and Trust for America’s Health have collaborated on an annual report series that examines crises of deaths of despair in America. For those not familiar, deaths of despair are deaths due to drug, alcohol, or suicide, and are a growing trend that go back decades. Our series, titled Pain in the Nation, dives deep into the data surrounding trends in these deaths with the hopes that the detailed findings will help inform and shape policies and legislation to help save a life.
This year’s report, which analyzed data compiled in 2020, confirmed what many of us know and witnessed first-hand: 2020 was a painful year for millions of Americans. It was the first year of COVID and the first year many of us had been asked to stay at home. Over the course of 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic initially tore through the world and upended virtually every aspect of daily life, the United States saw the highest number of these deaths of despair on record, with nearly 187,000 men, women, and children losing their lives. While I would encourage each and every one of you to review the full report, I do want to take the time to highlight a few key findings.
1) Death rates increased in 49 out of 50 states. With the notable exception of New Hampshire, every state in the country, plus the District of Columbia, recorded a higher number of deaths due to alcohol, drugs, and suicide in 2020 than in 2019. It was also the first year that any state’s mortality rate rose above 100 deaths per 100,000 residents, yet it happened in both West Virginia and New Mexico. The report includes a state-by-state breakdown and analysis, so readers can see where their home state ranked.
2) In part to cope with pandemic-fueled feelings of anxiety, isolation, and grief, and in part due to the longstanding unaddressed addiction crisis in this nation, people turned to alcohol and drug use in record numbers. Alcohol-induced deaths increased by 27 percent, and drug-induced deaths (driven by a spike in overdoses involving synthetic opioids like fentanyl) jumped by 30 percent compared to 2019. Similar to the pandemic itself, these deaths disproportionately impacted marginalized communities. Native Americans and Alaska Native peoples experienced the highest rates of alcohol deaths, and Black people experienced a 41 percent rise in drug-related deaths, the sharpest increase of any group.
3) The mental health crisis amongst America’s youth also continued its deadly trend. With the sudden loss of the structure, peer support, and social skill development that comes with attending school every day, and without sufficient access to mental health support resources, our children’s emotional health went into a tailspin. Children 17 and younger saw the highest increase in drug-induced deaths of any age group, at 78 percent, as well as the second-highest increase in suicides.
Our report this year includes a robust series of comprehensive policy recommendations for state and federal legislators, largely aimed at prevention and early intervention. We cannot expect a widespread improvement in Americans’ mental health until we take steps to improve the social determinants that affect their emotional well-being and their access to support and quality mental health care. This includes addressing socio-economic disparities in communities of color, ensuring broader access to family support programs, and increasing the presence of counselors and other school-based mental health staff and student support systems.
This is the fifth year of us releasing this report. The fifth year of me talking to countless media and other interested parties about the data, why they matter, and what we should be doing about it. I won’t lie to you – it gets harder each year. Why? It’s hard to know that every time I report on the data – every time I utter the phrase “the most ever” – that we as a nation still aren’t doing enough to meet this moment. Further, I worry that because the data and trends are so hard to comprehend – so high and in the wrong direction – that people will begin to become desensitized. Maybe I am wrong, but on my watch, I want to do everything I can to shine a spotlight on this massive problem, even when politicians and media pundits have forgotten about the unspeakable tragedies occurring in our nation every day.
If leaders at all levels continue their reactive approach to this rising death toll instead of getting ahead of it by implementing policies that emphasize community, prevention, and mental health treatment, our collective losses will continue to mount. If, however, we can all finally acknowledge that enough is enough, we can band together to help transform America’s mental health landscape and finally begin to ease our nation’s pain.
And what about the role big business plays? I think of the pharmaceutical companies who added to the opioid epidemic and find an ailment for their new drug, as well as the alcohol industry.