37% of U.S. high schoolers face mental health struggles amid COVID most or all the time, CDC finds

Many high school students report experiencing mental health problems during the coronavirus outbreak, according to a recent survey released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), with gay, lesbian, and bisexual high school students and girls especially likely to say their mental health has worsened during the pandemic.

A CDC survey found that 37% of public and private high school students reported that they were in a poor mental state most or all of the time during the pandemic. Research on the behavior and experiences of young peopleThe survey was conducted between January and June 2021. In the survey, “poor mental health” included stress, anxiety, and depression. Nearly one-third (31%) of high school students reported experiencing poor mental health most or all of the time in the 30 days prior to the survey. Additionally, 44% reported feeling sad or hopeless nearly every day for at least two consecutive weeks in the past 12 months, causing them to stop some of their usual activities. (Not all of the survey questions specifically asked about mental health during the pandemic.)

Gay, lesbian, and bisexual high school students experienced higher rates of mental health stress than their heterosexual peers. LGBT high school students were more than twice as likely as heterosexual students to say their mental health had been bad “most of the time” or “all of the time” during the pandemic (64% vs. 30%). More than half of LGBT students (55%) said their mental health had been bad at least “most of the time” in the 30 days prior to the survey, compared with 26% of heterosexual teens who said the same. And about three-quarters (76%) of LGBT high school students said they had felt sad or hopeless nearly every day for at least two weeks, causing them to stop some of their usual activities, compared with 37% of heterosexual students.

There were also gender differences. Nearly half of high school girls (49%) said their mental health was poor most or all of the time during the COVID-19 outbreak, nearly double the percentage of boys (24%) who said the same. Nearly four in four girls (42%) said they had felt that way in the 30 days prior to the survey, as did 20% of boys. Nearly six in six girls (57%) said they had felt sad or hopeless nearly every day for at least two consecutive weeks at some point in the 12 months prior to taking the survey (first half of 2021), causing them to stop engaging in their usual activities, compared with 31% of boys.

LGBT high school students were more likely than their heterosexual peers to seek mental health care via telehealth during the COVID-19 pandemic, including alcohol or drug use treatment or counseling. Nearly one in five LGBT students (19%) reported receiving telehealth care at some point during the pandemic, compared with 6% of heterosexual students. Girls were more likely than boys to receive mental health care via telehealth (10% vs. 7%, respectively).

The pandemic’s disruption to schooling, social activities, and family life has led the U.S. Surgeon General to say:Youth mental health crisisMental health among teenagers is considered “anxious” and there are high rates of stress. But public health experts have been calling attention to the mental health of teenagers even before the coronavirus outbreak. For example, another CDC survey conducted in 2015 found that LGBT teens Increased risk of depression A Pew Research Center analysis of pre-pandemic National Survey on Drug Use and Health data found that teenage girls were more likely to report recent experiences with depression than their male peers and were also more likely to seek treatment.