By Francine Conway and Frank A. Ghinassi
When COVID-19 emerged as a global health crisis nearly three years ago, national governments raced to find a vaccine. In the United States, Operation Warp Speed marshaled resources to do something that had never been done: develop a safe and effective inoculation in less than a year. Insiders dubbed the effort the Manhattan Project of vaccines.
Today, we need an equally bold undertaking to tackle the “other” COVID-19 pandemic — the mental health toll the virus has taken on our young people.
Data show a steep rise in rates of depression, anxiety, loneliness and suicide since COVID-19 first emerged. Young people have been hit especially hard. The Annie E. Casey Foundation reports that between 2016 and 2020, the year COVID-19 swept throughout the U.S., rates of anxiety and depression among young people ages 3 to 17 jumped 26% nationally. In New Jersey, the increase was 41%.
Researchers at Rutgers are leading efforts to understand the long-term health effects of this trend. Rutgers scholars have found that disruptions to daily routines, social isolation and anxiety over illness are affecting young people’s mental and behavioral health and leading to physical problems such as weight gain from overeating.
Yet, while our understanding of this hidden health crisis is becoming clear, our ability to treat the new pandemic remains insufficient. More than half of adolescents with a diagnosable behavioral or mental health illness are unable to get the care they need.
Several factors are driving this trend.
First, the way insurance providers calculate costs limits access to all but the wealthiest patients. For psychiatry and behavioral health, insurance rates are typically based on time spent with the patient, a model that doesn’t reflect what the market can bear.
For example, private insurance providers might pay doctors $140 for an initial visit and $100 an hour each subsequent visit. But that same doctor in New Jersey can charge self-payers $400 for an initial visit and $350 thereafter. As a result, there are very long lines for the few providers who take insurance and fewer and fewer people who can get the treatment they need.
The second issue affecting access is a shortage of providers. Many practitioners are aging out – the average age of a psychiatrist in the U.S. is 55 years old — and COVID-19 has accelerated the retirement of doctors. Moreover, with insurance rates driving pay down, younger doctors aren’t coming into the behavioral health disciplines.
What this means for New Jersey families is they must often resort to out-of-state options to receive support. As practitioners ourselves, we find it heartbreaking to hear the stories of parents desperately trying to help their kids.
A new initiative at Rutgers will offer some relief. After years of planning, and with the generous support of Rutgers alumna Marlene Brandt, we’ve launched the Youth Behavioral Health Initiative (YBHI) to provide mental health care and support for adolescents and young adults in New Jersey and throughout the Northeast. A research arm will foster innovation and learning.
Part of the initiative is the Brandt Behavioral Health Treatment Center and Residence at Cook Campus in New Brunswick. The center, scheduled to open next year, includes a 16-bed residential facility and an adjacent outpatient clinic, which will offer services to young people and their families, such as individual and group therapy, regardless of their ability to pay.
Once fully operational, the center’s doctors and clinicians will see as many as 2,500 outpatients every year and up to 225 patients in residence. The co-location of inpatient and outpatient services will enable a continuum of care – the full arc of treatment – that few other centers in the world can offer.
We are immensely proud of this initiative, but we know bricks and mortar alone won’t solve the crisis afflicting our youth. There are structural challenges that need urgent attention – from reforming insurance pay scales to encouraging more doctors to pursue careers in mental and behavioral health. Investments also are needed to diagnose illness, particularly in underserved communities.
The good news is unlike previous generations, today’s young people are more open to talking about their mental health, and in seeking care. But policymakers must meet them halfway. Just as they did in the race for a vaccine, leaders should dedicate more funding to the “other” pandemic.
The Manhattan Project was a remarkable moment in American scientific discovery. Although it produced technology that ultimately had devastating consequences, its ability to marshal public and private resources toward a single goal is laudable.
A similar collaborative effort is needed to address today’s youth mental and behavioral health crisis. At YBHI, our aim is to use the research engine of Rutgers to forge interdisciplinary teams that can address the region’s mental health treatment desert, solve grand challenges and serve the public good. Anything less would be a disservice to the millions of young people growing up in a pandemic.
Dr. Francine Conway is a licensed clinical psychologist and chancellor-provost of Rutgers University-New Brunswick.
Dr. Frank A. Ghinassi is president and chief executive of Rutgers Health University Behavioral Health Care and senior vice president of behavioral health and addictions service lines at RWJ Barnabas Health.
Here’s how to submit an op-ed or Letter to the Editor. Bookmark NJ.com/Opinion. Follow us on Twitter @NJ_Opinion and on Facebook at NJ.com Opinion. Get the latest news updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.com’s newsletters.
Follow us on Twitter @NJ_Opinion and on Facebook at NJ.com Opinion.
Ad Choices