- Findings from the 2020 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) suggest that the COVID-19 pandemic had a negative impact on the nation’s well-being. Between October to December 2020, youths ages 12 to 17 who had a past-year major depressive episode (MDE) reported they were more likely than those without a past-year MDE to feel that the COVID-19 pandemic negatively affected their mental health “quite a bit or a lot.” Adults 18 or older who had any mental illness or serious mental illness in the past year were more likely than adults without mental illness to report that the pandemic negatively affected their mental health “quite a bit or a lot.” During that same time period, approximately 25.9 million past-year users of alcohol and 10.9 million past-year users of drugs other than alcohol reported they were using these substances “a little more or much more” than they did before the COVID-19 pandemic began. (Press release here)
October 27, 2021
Mental Health