Youth in Colorado are struggling with mental health. That is one of the findings of the Colorado Children’s Campaign’s 30th annual Kids Count in Colorado report, released Tuesday, which tracks both the state and county levels in the areas of family economic prosperity, child and family health, early childhood learning and development, and youth success.
“More young Coloradans have been letting us know they are struggling with their mental health,” said Sarah Barnes, Senior Director of Policy at the Children’s Campaign. “The data in this year’s Kids Count in Colorado report reveal just how many young people are grappling with this issue – and point to opportunities to address some of the root causes of mental health challenges.”
According to the report, at the national level, the Youth Risk Behavior Survey found that almost every indicator of poor mental health worsened between 2011 and 2021, with 42% of U.S. high school students—and nearly 60% of female students—reporting persistent sadness or hopelessness in 2021. Colorado has seen similar troubling trends. According to the Colorado Health Access Survey, the share of Coloradans aged 18 and under who reported eight or more days of poor mental health in the past 30 days more than doubled in just six years.
While the proportion of Colorado high school students reporting suicidal thoughts or behaviors did not increase significantly between 2013 and 2021, it remains concerningly high, with 17% reporting they seriously considered suicide in the past year
“Colorado leaders must take steps to create communities that support our young people, including by bolstering the mental health workforce in and out of schools, ensuring families can meet their basic needs, and prioritizing the agency and wisdom of young people in policy and program development,” Barnes said.
A recent analysis from the Center for Improving Value in Health Care examined trends in Colorado emergency department visits related to mental health or self-harm. It found between 2016 and 2021, the number of mental health-related emergency department visits by children in Colorado increased by 140%. In comparison, mental health-related visits for adults increased by only 23% during the same period. In just five years, the share of mental health emergency department visits by children went from one in every 10 to one in six.
The number of emergency department visits for self-harm among Colorado children more than tripled during the same time period.
Colorado data points to challenges filling school-based mental health provider positions, particularly in rural communities. At the beginning of the 2022-23 school year, Colorado school districts reported approximately 278 vacant positions for school psychologists, school social workers and counselors. By the end of the school year, nearly 60% of these positions remained unfilled.
In Northeast Colorado, RE-1 Valley and Fort Morgan School Districts were the only districts with licensed psychologists and only those two and Yuma had social workers.
The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP) classifies Colorado and 41 other states as experiencing a “severe shortage” of practicing child and adolescent psychiatrists, physicians who specialize in diagnosing and treating mental or behavioral health conditions in kids and teens.
According to data AACAP released in 2022, of Colorado’s 64 counties 46, including and Logan and Morgan, had no practicing child or adolescent psychiatrist.
Other highlights from the 2023 KIDS COUNT in Colorado report:
• The share of Colorado kids without health insurance fell from 5.5% in 2019 to 4.6% in 2021—reflecting 12,000 fewer children without health coverage. In Logan County, 5.6% of children were uninsured. But post-pandemic policy changes mean many children are likely to lose their coverage in the year ahead.
• In 2020, firearms surpassed motor vehicle crashes to become the leading cause of death for American children ages 1 to 19 for the first time on record. In Colorado, 83 Colorado kids and teens ages 19 and under were killed by guns—the highest number on record in at least 20 years and more than double the number of kids killed by guns in 2000.
• Across Colorado, the need for child care outpaces its supply. Colorado’s licensed child care centers, family child care homes and preschools have capacity to serve just two-thirds of the children estimated to need care based on labor force participation among parents.
• Although Colorado’s overall child poverty rate sits well below the national rate of 17%, some communities have child poverty rates more than twice the national average. Costilla County had the highest child poverty rate in the state in 2021, at 36%, while Logan County had a rate of 18.1%.
• Colorado has stubborn disparities in child poverty rates by race and ethnicity. Between 2017 and 2021, poverty rates for American Indian or Alaska Native children and Black or African-American children in Colorado were triple the rates for white children; the poverty rate for Hispanic or Latino children in our state was more than double the rate for white children.
• Temporary expansions to the Child Tax Credit made in response to the pandemic cut child poverty in half in 2021—yet Congress let the expansions expire in December 2021, sending millions more U.S. kids back into poverty.
• In the 2021-2022 school year, more than one-third of Colorado students (36%) were chronically absent, a sharp rise from 26% the previous year. Logan County’s absenteeism rate was between 25 and 36% of students.
• The use of some substances, such as alcohol and tobacco, has become much less common among Colorado youth in recent years. Other indicators of substance use, such as the use of prescription pain medication without a prescription and the number of deaths due to accidental overdose, are stagnant or increasing.
