988 is the new number that Americans can call for help with mental health issues.
The number is backed by more than $400 million in federal funding and will go live on Saturday. Short-staffed call centers may not be prepared for the surge.
In the last few months, a lot of people who called the hotline disconnected before getting help. The New York Times analyzed data from the first half of the year and found that 18 percent of the calls were abandoned. The transition to a well- publicized three-digit phone number is expected to strain capacity more than previously thought.
Efforts to prepare for 988 were applauded by the secretary of health and human services, but he acknowledged that a lot of work was still to be done. He said in an interview that there needs to be someone who answers the phone once the project starts. It is not enough to get a busy signal.
Over the past half-year, hundreds of millions of dollars have been given to the Lifeline. The money has helped the chronically underfunded crisis line, long answered by a patchwork of call centers, often nonprofits that juggle several hotlines and rely on both paid counselors and volunteers, to bring the total to more than 200.
A Spanish-language network, national backup centers, and digital messaging services have been boosted by the funding.
About half a million people called the texting and chat lines during the first half of the year, but only a small amount were answered. The response rate climbed to 74 percent in June and the average wait time fell from 16 minutes in January to three minutes last month. One goal of 988 is to answer 95 percent of the calls in 20 seconds.
The service for the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration is managed by an executive at the nonprofit. There have been huge increases in response to digital messages. He predicted that the new investments would lead to improvements in answering phone calls, noting that call centers have already been able to keep up.
He said that they want to make sure that they respond to all crises.
According to a recent survey, less than half of the public health officials responsible for the 988 roll out felt confident in their community's readiness.
It's not just calls, texts and chats that are being changed. The vision for 988 is that counselors will eventually be able to connect callers with crisis teams that can come to where they are, as well as short-term mental health centers.
Advocates say that the changes will keep more people alive.
At a time when mental illness is on the rise, the new Lifeline comes at a good time. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, suicide was the 12th leading cause of death for Americans of all ages in 2020. Every 11 minutes, a person dies by suicide. The new hotline is intended to expand beyond the scope of suicide to help anyone who is in a crisis.
There are still questions about long-term sustainable funding for 988. The law signed by President Donald J. Trump left the funding of call centers largely to states.
Only four states have authorized a phone-bill charge, despite the fact that it gave states the option to raise money for 988 the same way they raise money for emergency services. Grants or general funds have been used by many other states.
Benjamin F. Miller is a psychologist and the president of Well Being Trust. It is the ingenuity, the creativity, the positioning that makes it work. It is the lack of resources, lack of leadership and follow-through.
Mental health in the country has always been an "afterthought" according to Dr. Miller.
He said that the marginalized aspect of our health care is why we don't invest a lot in it.
The executive director of the only 988 call center in South Carolina said that she was able to fill eight new positions thanks to federal funding. She feared that would not be enough in the long term, so her team was looking for grants and raising money through a website.
Ms. Piver is confident that we will be fine on Saturday. As the word gets out, it's not something that we're prepared for financially. The center answers over 80% of calls in the state, but if funding stays the same, she said, "we could see that dip pretty quickly to 50, 40, even 30 percent."
The labor shortage has made it difficult to hire and retain employees. There are work opportunities on the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's website.
Hannah Wesolowski, the chief advocacy officer for the National Alliance on Mental Illness, said that the work force was an issue for the mental health field before the swine flu hit.
Since 988 was signed into law, a lot of work has been done, but it will take more than a year to build a comprehensive system.
Representative Tony Crdenas, Democrat of California and a main congressional proponent of 988, said that 988 didn't start without problems.
Advocates are still hopeful that 988 will live up to its promise.
"People's lives are on the line, so we have to get there"
We will make it there.
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