October 12, 2023 – Nebraska is the state with the best levels of mental health, in accordance with a brand new rating that ranges from violent crime rates to air pollution. Rounding out the highest five spots were Connecticut, Massachusetts, Minnesota and Rhode Island.
The latest report“The Best States for Your Mental Health” was commissioned by a Georgia-based company called Soliant, which focuses on healthcare recruiting. In the report, the authors said they sought to incorporate a broader set of variables than simply measuring access to mental health care.
The rating was based on these eight things:
- The average variety of mentally unhealthy days per 30 days reported by individuals who participated in an annual CDC health survey
- The ratio of mental health providers to the state population, based on the Federal Register of Medicare and Medicaid Accepted Providers
- Suicide rate amongst people ages 15 to 24 within the state between 2018 and 2021
- Unemployment rate for people aged 16 and over
- Statewide violent crime rate in accordance with an FBI reporting system
- Access to exercise opportunities akin to public parks and physical activity facilities
- Air pollution
- Disconnected youth rate, which is the share of individuals ages 16 to 19 who’re neither working nor attending school, in accordance with census data
The report's authors found that the speed of disconnected youth was weighted similarly to many other variables within the evaluation, but had a major impact on a state's final rating. The authors wrote that socially disconnected youth “are at increased risk for violence, smoking, alcohol consumption, and marijuana use, and may have emotional deficits and lower cognitive and academic skills than their peers who are working and/or in school.”
In the highest state of Nebraska, the speed of disconnected youth was 4.3%, the bottom of all 50 states. Other reasons for Nebraska's top spot included having one in all the five lowest unemployment rates and one in all the five lowest rates of mental health issues days.
According to CDC survey results compiled for one more report published by the CDC, nearly 15% of U.S. adults nationwide reported poor mental health on at the very least 14 days of the past 30 days in 2021 United Health Foundation.
According to this, around one in five people within the USA suffers from a mental illness CDC.
If you or someone you recognize is struggling, help is accessible 24/7 via phone, chat or text on 988 Lifeline. It's free and confidential. Call or text 988 or leave on-line Chat.