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Health officials preparing to broaden the reach of a national mental-health crisis line are working to strengthen an overstretched network of call centers that didn’t connect with about one in six callers in recent years, a Wall Street Journal data review showed. (Abbott, Martinez and Tracy, 7/11)

Across the state, Illinois-based call centers answered just 1 in 5 in-state calls to the lifeline in the first three months of 2022. The other 80% were redirected to other states. Illinois has the lowest in-state answer rate in the nation, lagging far behind others. The state with the second-lowest rate, Texas, answered 40% of its calls during that same time period. (Barrett, 7/11)

State health officials, unsure they have the money or staff to respond to an expected flood of calls to 988 — the new mental health hotline number — are tempering expectations just days ahead of its launch. It’s a setback for the Biden administration, which had hoped the opening of the three-digit crisis line, billed as 911 for mental health care, would come with much fanfare. Instead senior officials find themselves downplaying Saturday’s launch as more of a “transition.” (Messerly and Owermohle, 7/12)

National suicide prevention hotlines are bracing for an influx of calls when the new, shorter number – 988 – launches Saturday. Proponents are hopeful it will ease access to services, decrease unnecessary interactions with the police and save lives. But some advocates are asking whether it will be ready to serve people with autism. (Hyson, 7/11)

“When you’re in crisis, you don’t know what to turn to,” Misty Vaughan Allen, suicide prevention coordinator for the Nevada Department of Health and Human Services, said on Monday. “Nine-eight-eight, with well-trained responders, will be such an easy access to a system of support,” she said. This system includes mobile crisis response teams, which are being expanded across the state, as well as crisis stabilization centers scheduled to open in the next year. (Hynes, 7/11)

Ask just about anyone for their thoughts on what causes homelessness, and you will likely hear drug addiction, mental illness, alcoholism and poverty. A pair of researchers, however, looked at those issues across the country and found they occur everywhere. What does vary greatly around the country, they found, was the availability of affordable housing. (Warth, 7/11)

A “fragmented and unresponsive” Alameda County mental health system is fueling the area’s worsening homeless crisis, according to a grand jury report. Among the symptoms:• Sick East Bay residents sent to jail instead of psychiatric treatment.• Crisis phone lines “not staffed by a live person” during nighttime and weekend hours when mental health crises are more likely to occur. (Hepler, 7/11)

Even cities that provide parks and trails for people to exercise and stay fit suffered worsening mental health during the pandemic. The annual ranking of the nation's fittest cities for the first time included data on the pandemic’s toll on mental health. With social isolation, job losses and supply chain challenges stressing Americans, nearly 40% of adults in the nation's 100 largest cities reported poor mental health. (Alltucker, 7/12)