By Erika Edwards -
NBC News
Sexual assault and other traumatic experiences have caused an unprecedented level of hopelessness and suicidal thoughts among young women in the United States, according to a report released Monday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). English).
“Our adolescent girls are experiencing an overwhelming wave of violence and trauma, and it is affecting their mental health,” said Kathleen Ethier, director of the CDC's Division of School and Adolescent Health.
Results from the 2021 Youth Risk Behavior Survey show troubling trends: Nearly three in five female adolescents (57%) reported feeling
“constantly sad or hopeless”
.
It is the highest rate in a decade.
And
30%
said they had seriously considered committing suicide, a percentage that has risen to nearly 60% in the past 10 years.
“These numbers are unprecedented,” Ethier said.
The survey, which has been carried out every two years for three decades, includes responses from 17,232 high school students in the country.
Overall, more than 40% of boys and girls said they had felt
so sad or hopeless
in the last year that
they were unable to do their usual activities,
such as schoolwork or sports, for at least two weeks.
When the researchers looked at gender differences, girls were much more likely to report such feelings than boys.
OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images
“It was very surprising to us that girls were continually doing worse than boys,” Ethier said.
At least 52% of teens who identified as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or questioning their gender said they had mental health problems.
(The survey did not ask if the people surveyed are transgender.)
LGBTQ+ children “experience much more stress
in their relationships at school, with peers, and at home,” said Julie Cerel, a licensed psychologist and director of the Suicide Exposure and Prevention Laboratory at the University of Kentucky.
The CDC survey found that more than
one in five of these young people (22%) had attempted suicide
in the past year.
Bullying and sexual violence
A dramatic increase in violent behavior, particularly against girls, was a stark finding in the CDC report.
One such attack received national attention this month when 14-year-old Adriana Kuch was assaulted in the hallway of a New Jersey high school.
Video of the incident was posted online in an attempt to "mock" her, her father said;
the young woman committed suicide days later.
Sexual violence has also increased among girls
, with one in five saying they have experienced it in the past year.
More than one in 10, 14%, said they had been forced to have sex.
That's a jump from the 11% of teen girls who said they had been sexually assaulted in 2019.
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The survey also found that alcohol use continues to decline: 23% of high school students said they drank in the past 30 days in 2021, up from 39% in 2011. Just 16% said they currently use marijuana, compared with 23% in 2011. About 12% said they had ever abused prescription opioids, up from 14% in 2019 and 2017, the first year this use was included in the report.
The survey
did not ask students about the reasons
for their feelings of sadness or thoughts of hurting themselves.
While anxiety and depression have increased among adolescents during the pandemic, the percentage of people with problems, especially among girls, has been increasing for years.
The CDC report
calls for more programs in schools, like sex education
, to address the growing mental health crisis.
But Cerel said that with limited funding, schools are ill-equipped to do more.
“
It is a lot to ask of schools with poorly paid and not necessarily trained teachers
“To tackle the wave of mental health problems, she said.
“What we've been doing hasn't been working,” she concluded.
If you or someone you know may be at risk,
call
or send a text message
to the number
988
of the suicide prevention line, which offers free, confidential and free support
in Spanish
24 hours a day, seven days a week.
You can also contact the network, formerly known as the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, by calling 800-273-8255, texting HOME to 741741, or visiting SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources