By Melissa Chan -
NBC News
The Veterans Crisis Line, which can be accessed by dialing 1 after calling 988, recorded a record number of calls for help in March, the US Department of Veterans Affairs reported, amid growing concern about the mental health of veterans and members of the armed forces who have served after the attacks of September 11, 2001.
The National Suicide Prevention Line – which offers 24/7 services through 988 – received more than 88,000 calls, text messages and chats in March,
the highest number of monthly contacts ever recorded
, according to federal data obtained by NBC News. , sister network of Noticias Telemundo.
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This figure is almost 28% higher than the highest in any of the first ten months of the pandemic and 15% higher than in August 2021, when calls soared after the fall of Kabul at the hands of the Taliban.
"We are facing a mental health tsunami
," warned Scott Mann, a retired Army lieutenant colonel who served three times in Afghanistan.
The number of annual contacts increased 15% in 2022, from about 775,000 in 2020 to nearly 896,000, according to department statistics.
There were about 74,000 applications in March 2022, nearly 67,000 in March 2021 and about 67,500 in March 2020, according to the data.
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The Veterans Administration said in a statement that "there is no hard data that can fully explain this increase," but it is possible that more people are using the line due to a combination of factors such as outreach campaigns and the implementation of the 988 telephone number. from the National Suicide Prevention Hotline.
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But many veterans believe the surge is directly related to the chaotic end to the 20-year conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan, in which they fought simultaneously and without conscription, meaning they were deployed more than any other generation and for longer. .
"Every time you got out of the conflict, you came back into it," says Jonathan Cleck, a former Navy SEAL.
Now, after the end of the longest war in US history,
"everything we've repressed is coming to the surface
," Cleck acknowledges.
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About 62% of combat veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan said they knew someone who had been killed in the line of duty, a 2011 Pew Research Center survey revealed.
"It's a wound to the soul"
A newly released survey by the non-profit organization, US Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans, found that nearly 49% of veterans experience trauma as a result of events that occurred during the US withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Matt Zeller, 41, an Army veteran and senior adviser to this organization, explained that he and many others are
wracked with extreme guilt for leaving tens of thousands of Afghan interpreters and allies behind
, an invisible wound that spells of moral injury.
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"It's a wound to the soul," lamented Zeller, who served nine months in Afghanistan in 2008. "And it's the most insidious wound a veteran can sustain."
"There's no pill they can give you. There's no group or individual therapy session you can go to. You can't paint or sing your way out of this," Zeller added.
"It leads a person to take their own life."
Scott Mann, retired Army lieutenant colonel. Courtesy Scott Mann.
Immediately after the withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Veterans Crisis Line saw a 98% increase in help messages compared to the same period a year earlier, department officials reported at the time.
Among those affected was Mann, a retired Army lieutenant colonel who served as a Green Beret for nearly two decades.
Mann, 54, said he struggled with suicidal thoughts in 2013, when he retired from the Army and began the transition to civilian life after multiple deployments.
Eight years later, he said, the end of the war in Afghanistan "brought me back to that place."
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"It got pretty dark for me
," she recounted.
"The depression hit me hard because of the way the war ended, because of the way our leaders abandoned our allies."
The number of monthly contacts with the Veterans Crisis Line decreased after August 2021, but increased again in the summer of 2022, close to the first anniversary, according to the data.
That moment also coincided with the launch of the 988 telephone number of the National Suicide Prevention Line.
In January, the line handled a record 85,500 contacts before peaking at 88,000 in March.
Data on Veteran Suicides Lacking
More than 6,800 U.S. servicemen died during operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to the Defense Department, but because the Veterans Administration doesn't track suicides broken down by generations, there's no way to know exactly how many veterans have removed their masks. Life after 9/11.
Matt Zeller served nine months in Afghanistan in 2008. Courtesy Matt Zeller.
This makes it difficult to find effective solutions, says Cole Lyle, a former Marine and Veterans Administration adviser and director of Mission Roll Call, a nonprofit group.
"I don't think you can address a problem until you have an idea of its scope and magnitude," Lyle said.
"You have to have precise data and we don't have them."
Research from Brown University noted in 2021 that
more than 30,000 military and post-9/11 veterans have died by suicide
, four times the number killed in combat.
[988 is launched throughout the country: the telephone line for the prevention of suicide]
Although the Veterans Administration's latest annual suicide prevention report doesn't break down deaths by generation, it does show a mental health crisis among the very young.
In 2020, the most recent year for which death data is available,
suicide rates were highest among veterans ages 18 to 34.
The numbers in that group increased from 2019 to 2020, while they decreased for everyone else, according to the report.
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Without accurate federal data, many veterans keep a personal tally based on information gleaned from their social circles.
Mann has lost three friends to suicide since the end of the war
, one of whom was a fellow Green Beret and two other combat infantrymen.
Zeller said he knows of five veterans who died by suicide after the last U.S. service member left Afghanistan in 2021. From then on, Zeller had no courage to count any further.
"I stopped tracking," he said.
"I stopped asking that question."
If you or someone you know is in crisis, call 988 to get in touch with the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. You can also call 800-273-8255, text HOME to 741741, or visit
SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources.
