Last month’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report, which found that nearly 1 in 3 teen girls seriously considered suicide in 2021, is the last straw.
It’s the last straw for researchers like me who have been sounding the alarm about teen mental health for years and often found ourselves dismissed. In data I analyzed for my upcoming book, “Generations,” teen depression doubled between 2011 and 2019 even before the start of the pandemic, and emergency room admissions for self-harm quadrupled between 2010 and 2021 among 10- to 14-year-old girls.
But more importantly, it’s the last straw for teen girls and their parents, who have been suffering for years but seeing little change. The CDC report has pushed several points to the forefront that are crucial for families to understand. As the mother of three girls, two of them teenagers, I have a personal interest in this topic as well as a professional one….