Calling the moment adolescent girls in the US are going through as dramatic is more than an understatement. At least in light of a new report just released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) which concludes that the minors are “plunged into a rising wave of violence and trauma”.
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According to this study, throughout 2021, one in three girls enrolled in high school seriously considered suicide during that year, while almost two reported being raped or sexually assaulted.
In both cases, the CDC figures constitute worrying increases in relation to previous years and something that has the authorities in a state of alarm.
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In relation to suicides, it is an increase of 60 percent in a decade while in the case of sexual abuse, it is equivalent to a rise of 27 percent in two years and the highest figure recorded since they began to document this type of phenomena.
“It’s chilling to think that out of 10 adolescent girls you know, at least one or more have been raped, which is the highest level we’ve ever recorded. And it’s almost certain that this rise in violent sexual violence against them is one of the factors that is contributing to the increase in depressive symptoms that can contribute to suicidality. Of course, we are extremely alarmed and this is something we have to investigate and attack,” says Kathleen Ethier, director of the CDC’s Division of School and Adolescent Health and a of those who worked on the report.
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It’s chilling to think that out of 10 teenage girls you know, at least one or more have been raped, which is the highest level we’ve ever recorded.
The CDC’s analysis was based on data collected in late 2021 through the Youth Risk Behavior Survey, which is conducted every two years in the US and is in this they are the first to be collected since the covid-19 pandemic broke out in 2020.
The CDC report also includes another series of worrying data. Among them, that 3 out of 5 adolescent girls (or 60 percent) went through a period of sadness or hopelessness so acute in 2021 that she was forced to abandon regular academic, social and sports activities. A figure that doubles the proportion registered in adolescent children and the highest in a decade.
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Girls also fared worse on other measures, with higher rates of alcohol and drug use than children and higher levels of electronic bullying.
According to the nearly 90-page report, overall, 13 percent of the country’s teens attempted suicide in 2021 compared with 7 percent for boys the same age.
In its report, the CDC does not evaluate the causes of the increases in suicides or cases of depression, nor those responsible for the incidents of sexual abuse.
However, experts on these issues and previous reports provide clues as to what could be happening. Speaking to the Washington Post, Sharon Hoover, an expert in child and adolescent psychiatry at the University of Maryland, said she was surprised not only by the sharp increases but by the disparity between genders.
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Regarding the second, Hoover argues, it could be associated with the fact that women tend to be more open than young people when it comes to talking about their feelings and traumatic incidents.
“There probably isn’t a single cause to explain the data, but rather interacting causes that vary by race, ethnicity, class, culture, and access to mental health resources. Still, girls are more likely to respond to the pain of the world by internalizing conflict, stress and fear, and boys are more likely to translate those feelings into anger and aggression Boys are more likely to mask depression while girls may be more vulnerable to social media and a culture obsessed with attractiveness and body image,” says Richard Weissbourd, a psychologist and tenured professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
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However, for these two experts, that does not explain the magnitude of the increases that were registered during 2021.
For them, the deepest cause behind the high numbers is associated with the devastating effect that the covid-19 pandemic had on this population, the social isolation that it caused and the economic uncertainty that their families experienced. As early as 2021 and 2022, two reports from the American Academy of Pediatrics had declared a national adolescent mental health emergency.
According to those reports, “the isolation and stress of the pandemic lockdowns were followed by an increase in domestic violence,” and may have also fueled an increase in sexual assault of adolescent girls.
But it was not all bad news. Overall, the CDC report documented significant declines in teen drug and alcohol use and a decline in teen sexual activity over the past decade.
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Something that is probably also explained by the isolation product of the pandemic years.
Despite this, adolescent girls reported higher levels of use of alcohol and other drugs such as cocaine, heroin, inhalants, methamphetamine and hallucinogens compared to men.
SERGIO GOMEZ MASERI
EL TIEMPO correspondent
Washington
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