A rising share of teenage women thought of and tried suicide in 2021 as their psychological well being deteriorated in the course of the second 12 months of COVID-19 restrictions, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.
Among highschool women responding to the CDC’s newest Youth Risk Behavior Survey, 30% stated they severely thought of trying suicide in 2021, up from 24.1% in 2019. The share of women in grades 9-12 who made a suicide plan rose from 19.9% to 23.6% and the share who tried to take their very own lives rose from 11% to 13.3% over the identical interval.
By comparability, psychological well being consultants have reported that teen women had been extra doubtless to make use of social media as a coping mechanism in the course of the pandemic. That left them feeling worse as they in contrast themselves to the best lives of others on-line or consumed movies passively, with out interacting with others on-line.
The CDC attributed the rise in suicidal tendencies amongst teen women to social isolation and a lack of feeling of “connectedness” with college friends throughout pandemic lockdowns. After closing their campuses in March 2020, most excessive faculties prolonged digital and hybrid studying preparations all through 2020 and 2021.
“School connectedness was also associated with a lower prevalence of lifetime marijuana use overall, across sex and grade levels, and among White and heterosexual students,” the CDC stated Friday in a abstract of the findings.
Suicide charges amongst teenage boys remained unchanged from earlier than to after the pandemic, the survey discovered.
Mental well being consultants have speculated that teen boys felt extra socially related than women throughout pandemic lockdowns on account of their greater tendency to play on-line video video games that includes chat packing containers with their associates.
The CDC surveys youngsters each two years on questions on subjects reminiscent of sexual exercise, substance use and psychological well being. The newest nationwide survey polled 13,677 college students in 2019 and 17,232 college students in 2021.
This 12 months’s survey discovered that college students who felt much less socially related in the course of the pandemic had been extra prone to expertise “poor mental health, marijuana use, prescription opioid misuse, sexual intercourse, unprotected sex, experiencing forced sex, and missing school because of feeling unsafe.”
Other findings within the survey included:
*24% of teenagers recognized as non-heterosexual in 2021, up from 11% in 2019.
*Among the 5.2% of teenagers who stated they had been “questioning” or not sure about their sexual identification, three out of each 4 reported a historical past of being abused.
*The share of teenagers who stated they by no means had intercourse dropped from 38% in 2019 to 30% in 2021.
*10.2% of highschool college students stated they tried to kill themselves within the earlier 12 months, in comparison with about 8% in 2019.
*30% of 14-18-year-old college students stated they’d poor psychological well being “most of the time” in 2021. For women, it was 40%.
*Around 30% of excessive schoolers abused substances usually in 2021, with one in six utilizing marijuana and one in 16 utilizing opioids.
*22% of scholars drank alcohol usually in 2021; about half that quantity had been binge drinkers who consumed a number of grownup drinks in a single sitting.
*Nearly one in 30 college students stated in 2021 that they usually walked round with a gun.
Content Source: www.washingtontimes.com