General Mental Health
- A recent study revealed Medicaid enrollees struggle to receive psychiatric care. The largest Medicaid-managed care plans across four U.S. cities only had 17.8% of psychiatrists or mental health professionals listed as in-network for Medicaid who were reachable, accepted Medicaid, and could provide a new patient appointment. Read more here.
- Simone Biles credited her return to the Olympics this year primarily to being ‘in a really good spot mentally.’ She described her devotion to weekly therapy as ‘kinda religious.’ Her athletic performances at the Paris Olympics this month were thrilling, earning her three gold medals and one silver medal. But what I really admire is her commitment to keeping her mental health in the limelight right alongside her gymnastics accomplishments. Read more here.
Youth Mental Health
- To note that a mental-health crisis is hitting American adolescents and young adults is hardly news—data to that effect emerge almost every day. The latest confirmation, in April, comes from a survey that I was grateful to help develop: This major survey, sponsored by the Walton Family Foundation and fielded by Gallup, revealed that some 38 percent of respondents aged 12 to 26 had received a formal diagnosis of anxiety or depression. Read more here.
Suicide Trends
- The spread of suicidal behavior among individuals is often described as a contagion; however, rigorous modeling of suicide as a dynamic, contagious process is minimal. Here, we develop and validate a model-inference system depicting suicide ideation and death and use it to quantify the contagion processes in the U.S. associated with two prominent celebrity suicide events: Robin Williams during 2014 and Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain, which occurred three days apart during 2018. Read more here.
Gender-Affirming Care and LGBTQ Issues
- “Amid the Biden—Harris administration’s unprecedented assault on Title IX, we write to urge the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) to update your student-athlete participation policy to require that only biologically female students participate in women’s sports,” a letter, addressed to NCAA President Charlie Baker and signed by GOP senators including Sens. Marsha Blackburn (Tenn.), Tommy Tuberville (Ala.), Katie Britt (Ala.), and Joni Ernst (Iowa), reads. Read more here.
- Youth who identify as LGBTQ+ reported higher rates of poor mental health and experiencing suicidal thoughts and behaviors than their cisgender and heterosexual peers, a new U.S. survey found. In 2023, more than three in five LGBTQ+ high school students said they experienced persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness, and more than half reported having poor mental health, according to the latest results of the Youth Risk Behavior Survey, published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Read more here.
Federal and State Policy
- Delaware Gov. John Carney signed two pieces of legislation that support student mental health in schools. The first new law will help establish a mental health services unit for high schools in Delaware. This unit will lower the ratio of students to counselors and make mental health services a lot more accessible. The second law will expand the reimbursement of school-based behavioral health services through Medicaid. Read more here.
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