US teen girls engulfed by sadness, survey finds

Teenage girls in the United States are experiencing record levels of sexual violence, sadness and suicidal thoughts, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says, with 30 percent of those surveyed saying they have seriously considered killing themselves.

"Our teenage girls are suffering through an overwhelming wave of violence and trauma, and it's affecting their mental health," said Kathleen Ethier, director of the CDC's Division of Adolescent and School Health.

According to the CDC's 2021 Youth Risk Behavior Survey, 57 percent of teenage girls reported experiencing persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness in the year, compared with 36 percent in 2011. Thirty percent said they had seriously considered attempting suicide in 2021, compared with 19 percent in 2011.

Students who took part in the survey were not asked about reasons for their feelings of sadness or thoughts of harming themselves.

"As a parent to a teenage girl, I am heartbroken," the CDC's chief medical officer, Debra Houry, said on Monday. "As a public health leader, I'm driven to act."

Kathleen Ethier, director of the CDC's Adolescent and School Health division, said: "Our teenage girls are suffering through an overwhelming wave of violence and trauma, and it's affecting their mental health."

The CDC survey, which has been conducted every second year for 30 years, includes responses from 17,232 US high school students across the country.

Gender differences

More than 40 percent of boys and girls said they had felt so sad or hopeless within the previous year that they were unable to do their regular activities, such as schoolwork or sports, for at least two weeks. When researchers looked at gender differences, girls were far more likely to report such feelings than boys.

The CDC found that 29 percent of high school boys reported instances of persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness in 2021, compared with 21 percent in 2011. Fourteen percent of high school boys reported having seriously considered attempting suicide, compared with 13 percent in 2011.

Among the teenagers surveyed, girls were more likely to have suffered sexual violence, the CDC found. Eighteen percent of girls in high school said they experienced sexual violence in the previous year, compared with 15 percent in 2017, the first year the CDC began monitoring the trend.

"This is truly alarming," Ethier said. "For every 10 teenage girls you know, at least one of them, and probably more, has been raped."

The US needs to focus on programs that will prevent sexual violence, Houry said. "High school should be a time for trailblazing, not trauma. These data show our kids need far more support to cope, hope and thrive."

Agencies contributed to this story.