Quick help for suicide thoughts and other mental health emergencies may soon be as easy as 9-8-8
In this Sunday, Aug. 11, 2019, photo, a man uses a cell phone in New Orleans. Quick help for suicidal thoughts and other mental health emergencies may soon be as easy as 9-8-8. The United States’ first nationwide three-digit mental health crisis hotline goes live on Saturday, July 16, 2022. Quick help for suicidal thoughts and other mental health emergencies may soon be as easy as 9-8-8.
“This is one of the most exciting things that has happened” in mental health care, said Dr. Brian Hepburn, a psychiatrist who heads the National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors. Nearly 60% said call-center staffers had specialized suicide prevention training; half said they had mobile crisis response teams available 24/7 with licensed counselors; and fewer than one-third had urgent mental-health care units., an existing network of over 200 crisis centers nationwide staffed by counselors who answer millions of calls each year — about 2.4 million in 2020. Calls to the old lifeline, 1-800-273-8255, will still go through even with 988 in place.
A desperate call to a Utah state senator in 2013 helped spark the idea of a three-digit mental health crisis line.
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