TENNESSEE, USA — Each year, the Tennessee Commission on Children and Youth (TCCY) releases a "State of the Child" report, to get a pulse on how the state is performing on things that impact the health and safety of children.
Some of the most concerning 2023 statistics show growing rates of depression.
In the report, it states:
Within the last year, 53 percent of high school girls and 30 percent of high school boys felt sad or hopeless almost every day for two or more weeks, representing a 63 percent increase since 2011.
TCCY said there's been an increase in mental health struggles since the pandemic, especially in young girls.
"The pandemic was really hard on young women and high school girls," TCCY Director of Communications Kylie Graves said. "They report higher rates of depression of suicidal behaviors of restrictive eating behaviors. And that continues to be a challenge."
Donna Johnson teaches mental health at Pellissippi State and is a nurse practitioner at Ridgeview Mental Health Facility. She said she isn't surprised by the statistics in this report and said social media plays a part, along with other factors.
"A lot of these young ladies are going through hormonal changes a lot earlier than they used to," Johnson said. "So there's a lot of things that are going on now that are causing this huge increase, not to mention economic conditions."
In the report, it states:
Tennessee ranked among the top twenty states in rate of suicides among ages 9-17 and in the top 10 in rate of firearm suicides among the same ages. Since 2018 the firearm suicide rate among young adults has increased from 10.3 per 100,000 to 14.1 per 100,000.
TCCY makes recommendations to lawmakers on policy changes based on their findings. TCCY's Executive Director Richard Kennedy said he had a realization when he came across old recommendations while cleaning an office.
"I thought to myself, I thought I've never seen this folder, I wonder what we were asking for in 1988, or 1989," Kennedy said. "When I pulled out that document and started reading it, what I realized is that we were still recommending and asking for a lot of the things that we were recommending and asking in 1988."
If these statistics alarm you and you want to do something about it, you can contact your representatives. Here's a link to find out who yours is.