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At 14 years old, I hated who and what I was. With barely one foot in adolescence, I had already marched through miles of hell. In San Diego, my hometown, I had been beaten, sexually abused and propelled into the nightmarish worlds of drug addiction and sex work. Americans are thinking a lot about mental health. Yet far too often we ignore how hard it is for racial, ethnic, gender and sexual minorities to access quality mental health services. As a gay Latino, I can see this is a recipe for America — and its marginalized communities — to come apart at the seams. (Jesse Leon, 6/5)

Doctors undergo rigorous training to ensure we have the mental and physical stamina required for whatever challenges come our way. Many of us develop the endurance to carry out the Hippocratic Oath during the most trying times, with the understanding that our work will be demanding. Yet while our job is to care for others, we have traditionally been discouraged from speaking openly about our own mental health. (Dr. Nigel Girgrah, 6/6)

We know that the recipe for a functioning society includes hard-working and motivated citizens. But how do you create such individuals? The answer must include youth who feel supported. You cannot have a population equally prepared to contribute to society without supporting their mental health through the process. Unfortunately, the COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately affected the mental health of our youth. Beside COVID-19, the mental health crisis is a second pandemic that our youth now face. Lawmakers must make mental health a priority. (Anna Winchester, 6/7)

In a news conference last week after the shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Tex., Gov. Greg Abbott (R) proclaimed that “Anybody who shoots somebody else has a mental health challenge, period. We as a government need to find a way to target that mental health challenge and to do something about it.” Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin (R) echoed Abbott’s sentiment: “Maybe we could have caught it. Maybe if we had the counselors, maybe if we had the mental health people, we could do it.” (Vivien Burt, Robin Berman and Sonya Raminsky, 6/3)

Spurred by rising violence with firearms, the nation began work to write into law “the strongest gun control measures in over 40 years.” Alas for Americans, that nation is Canada. (Jackie Calmes, 6/3)

An analysis of studies of the effects of lockdowns on COVID-19 mortality has just been released by a team of researchers at Johns Hopkins University, and their conclusion is depressing. “Our study finds that lockdowns had little to no effect in reducing COVID-19 mortality,” they wrote. “However, lockdowns during the initial phase of the COVID-19 pandemic have had devastating effects.” (6/5)

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to devastate the United States, young adults are facing the consequences of becoming emancipated from foster care. Once a young person turns 18 years old, they are legally no longer a child and cannot be considered as a foster placement. Those who age out of foster care must adjust to living independently and facing a great deal of adversity. They are expected to move out and start their lives on their own amid an ongoing pandemic. The teens will find themselves in need of jobs, a place to liveand a means of transportation just to survive. The goal of foster care programs should be to support teens that age out of the system by making sure that they have successful transitions into self-sufficiency. (Wilkins, 6/7)