Depression and anxiety among youth has surged across the state, according to a recently released report. But resources to support adolescent mental health remain insufficient.
The October report from Children’s Alliance, a statewide child advocacy and racial justice organization, found that Washington is 48th nationally in youth mental health. While recent strides have been made to address the crisis, improving mental health among children and teens requires a sustainable, systemic solution, the report said.
“It is incredibly frustrating to see that there are solutions and that there are states that are solving this. But we are so far off from that, as we reported,” said Reid Saaris, author of the report. “I think the challenge in our state is that we’re not coordinated in what we’re doing. Whose job is it to solve this problem, come together and put solutions in place?”
In 2020, 1 in 6 teens experienced a major depressive episode, 3 million had serious thoughts of suicide, and mental health-related emergency department visits increased by 31 percent, according to Carelon, a statewide behavioral health provider.
Saaris said without coordinated efforts between agencies, the result is small pockets of success but not change as a whole.
“We’re doing a little bit of good here, and a little bit of good there, but systemically, we’re not asking these bigger questions and building collaborative solutions to those,” he said.
Local crisis
In Clark County, the Youth Behavioral Health Navigator program at Carelon provides specialized care coordination for high-risk youth. This helps reduce time spent in the emergency room.
Brook Vejo, a therapist and child mental health specialist, oversees the Clark County team. Through the program, Vejo guides school-age youth and families to resources they need such as housing and mental health services.
Since the program launched in Southwest Washington in 2023, Vejo’s team has accepted 273 referrals for youth in Clark County.
But not everyone who needs help is receiving it.
“We’re definitely at our capacity. I’ve always seen a great need in the Southwest Washington community,” Vejo said. “Access is challenging here, and it’s not for lack of professionals trying. There’s just a big lack of staff who are qualified to see kids, including kids with challenging needs.”
Vejo used to oversee the Youth Mobile Crisis Intervention team, a group of mental health providers who work with children and teenagers who call the Southwest Washington Crisis Line.
In her experience, the COVID-19 pandemic worsened the youth mental health crisis, along with a shortage of providers, affordability and other logistical challenges.
In addition, providing therapy for a child means being knowledgeable in treating the needs of the family as a whole, Vejo said. This may be challenging for therapists who have recently graduated and are still navigating the field.
“The number of kids who need support is continuing to grow,” Vejo said. “It’s so important that we come together as a community and work together and not have everyone siloed in different areas.”
Solutions
Currently, 54 percent of Washington youth do not receive access to adequate care — that equals 80,000 Washington adolescents.
Another 15 percent of youth said that they are seriously considering suicide, according to the report.
“There are kids in all parts of the state that are grappling with this challenge,” Children’s Alliance Executive Director Stephan Blanford said. “There still might not be enough urgency around this issue, so that leads to a sense of frustration. It has huge implications across the state. If we can’t get a hold of this, it’s going to have lifelong implications.”
Students of color now make up a majority in Washington’s schools, but only 22 percent of Washington’s youth-serving therapists are people of color, according to the report.
Blanford said there is a need for diversity among providers and that could be one of the reasons Washington is so much further behind in terms of mental health access.
“Schools, as we know, are under-resourced and not equitably resourced, so you have a lot of students who are in need,” Blanford said. “To add one more really large thing to an already overflowing plate, is a guarantee that it’s not going to be done well or equitably.”
Part of the strategy outlined in the report is not to address the crisis district by district, but to propose to the Legislature a wide-ranging solution for all schools in the state, especially those that are rural, Blanford said.
The report also proposes an updated leadership approach with a focus on enforcing social media age limits, expanding access to group therapy and launching a common platform where screening, evidence-based interventions and therapy can be accessed by all Washington youth in 2025.
Saaris said Children’s Alliance is calling on the next governor of Washington to, at minimum, appoint a person dedicated solely to youth mental health. The organization is also calling on the Legislature to provide ample resources for these efforts — a bare minimum of $17.5 million in the first year.
“Really, it’s time to get to the systemic level of thinking about 1.7 million kids, what they need, and are we a state that’s going to provide strong, evidence-based care?” Saaris said. “I think that’s what we have to take on this next legislative session.”
