45% of them have "seriously considered attempting suicide in 2021" and 14% of the total have attempted suicide during the year.
Almost half of LGBTQ youth in the United States have "seriously considered attempting suicide" in 2021, according to a poll released Wednesday.According to Amit Paley, executive director of The Trevor Project, the LGBTQ youth suicide prevention organization that conducted the survey, it "shows that rates of suicidal thoughts have been on the rise over the past three years among young LGBTQ", (acronym for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer).
Figures much higher than those found among heterosexuals
The poll, conducted among 34,000 young people aged 13 to 24 who identify as LGBTQ, shows that 45% have "seriously considered attempting suicide in 2021", and 14% of the total have attempted suicide in the past. of the year. In the 13 to 17 age group, the figure rises to 50%.More broadly, experts have noted an increase in the suicide rate among young people in the United States, especially high school students, during the Covid-19 pandemic and the social isolations it has caused.But a 2019 study by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), America's top health authority, already found there was "a significant difference among high school students nationwide in having seriously considered a attempted suicide based on sexual orientation. Thus, 14.5% of students who identified as heterosexual answered in the affirmative to this question, but among students who identified as lesbian, gay, or bisexual, the figure was 46.8%.
The context of recent years in the country has only reinforced these trends, analyzes The Trevor Project."The Covid-19 pandemic and an unprecedented wave of anti-transgender legislation continue to negatively affect the mental health of young LGBTQ people," the association said in its report.
A phenomenon on the rise
She argues that the number of young LGBTQ people in the United States who have "seriously considered attempting suicide" is up two percentage points from her 2020 poll, and five points from 2019.Overall, 73% of LGBTQ youth in the United States reported experiencing symptoms of anxiety in 2021 and 58% symptoms of depression.More than nine in 10 transgender or non-binary youth among those surveyed also say they have worried during 2021 that transgender people are being denied access to care related to their transition journey due to local laws.