The Patriot Post® · The CDC's Teen Depression Epidemic

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently released a study on children’s mental health, specifically that of teenagers during the months of January 2021 to June 2021. The findings of that survey are another confirmation of just how damaging the CDC’s own COVID guidelines for schools were upon teenagers’ mental health.

The study notes:

More than one in three high school students (37.1 percent) experienced poor mental health during the Covid-19 pandemic. In addition, 44.2 percent of students experienced persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness, almost 20 percent seriously considered suicide, and 9.0 percent attempted suicide during the 12 months before the survey.

The teenage years are no cakewalk for anyone. The significant mental and emotional development during that stage of life is often marked by higher levels of anxiety over a variety of social and identity issues. However, what the CDC’s study shows is that the government’s overly aggressive response to the COVID pandemic not only served to do severe damage to the nation’s economy but also significantly exacerbated teenage anxiety.

Much of this rise in negative mental health corresponded with the rise in online instruction — some 50% of students were forced to do school at home. Furthermore, the broad social distancing restrictions across the rest of society inherently led to further feelings of isolation. The uptick in teens despairing of life appears to have directly contributed to the increase in suicidal thoughts and attempts. The study shows that kids who felt disconnected were twice as likely to attempt suicide.

The obvious issue here, which many of us were warning about early on regarding the government’s heavy-handed response to COVID, was that the “cure” was worse than the disease, and for many teenagers this study bears that out. But the CDC simply observes that the pandemic “created traumatic stressors that have the potential to further erode student’s mental well-being” without noting how its recommendation of extended social distancing, specifically regarding schools, was a direct contributing factor.

The politicization of the pandemic led to a needlessly draconian response, which in turn resulted in the problem of social isolation on top of the pandemic. The Left employs the same logic when it comes to guns used in crimes. The primary cause of the violence is not the existence of firearms; rather it is the lawless actions of criminals. In the case of the pandemic, it’s a huge problem that the response to it created so much misery and death.