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Worsening economic conditions have state officials warning about an increase in homelessness across the state. This year, O’ahu’s Point in Time count of homeless individuals will not include those who are unsheltered, or on the street. More than one hundred volunteers who trek annually from tent to tent, will not be doing that this year.

Oahu’s annual Point in Time homeless count is being modified in light of Covid-19 considerations. Unsheltered homeless will not be counted, according to Laura E. Thielen,  Executive Director of Partners in Care, or PIC, which conducts the count. 

“We use a lot of volunteers, and the recognition that we lost a frontline service worker to Covid. We want to respect the fear of Covid, as well as, it would be awful if we did the unsheltered count and we might be the case of a cluster of Covid cases.”

Thielen says Partners in Care will do a detailed dive into their island-wide shelter database to determine how many homless are there as a result of the pandemic. On the street, she says, people from out of state did not add to the homeless population while strict travel bans were in place, and the eviction moratorium is keeping mpeople in their homes.

State Homeless Coordinator Scott Morishige says he expects homelessness caused by the pandemic to outstrip the 37% increase that resulted from the ’08 recession. The increase peaked eight years later, and involved about 2100 additional homeless individuals. 

Thielen says progress on homeless and housing issues can continue this legislative session despite the lack of funds.

“We have a unique opportunity to really look at the policy side of things that doesn’t necessarily require funding. And I think the expansion of the state hospital system and making sure those mental health services are provided on a regular basis with folks, that is definitely high on our priority list.”

According to Thielen, there are bright spots. Telehealth is working for some situations, and for the 79 known homeless veterans on Oahu, Partners in Care just kicked off a program to get them all into permanent housing by the end of the year.

Read more on HawaiiPublicRadio.com.

Ray Conner traces his ambition to be a barber back to when he was a kid in Detroit. Growing up, he was abused. He watched his mother battle drug and alcohol addictions. He often went to bed hungry. When he needed to get away, he went down to A Cut Above Barber Shop on Eight Mile Road for a fresh cut and some companionship from his barber, Jessie. The relationship carried him through some of the darkest days of his life.

“Jessie may not remember me but him being my barber as a kid saved my life and it is now because of him that I am not only a Master Barber but a Barber Instructor,” Conner wrote on the shop’s Google reviews a few months ago.

Conner, based in Johnson City, Tennessee, was inspired to become both a barber and a mentor for other young Black men facing adversity.

“If I can give what he gave to me, then I know I’m doing something great.” Conner told CNN

The Confess Project Barber Coalition, a non-profit created to help Black men and boys become the best version of themselves, hosted a workshop in his town early last year. Conner immediately knew he needed to get involved. He was struck by how the organization’s founder, Lorenzo Lewis, spoke frankly about his own hardships. Through the coalition, he was shown not only how to better take care of his mental health, but also given the tools to provide that same support system to his clients.

Systemic racism has created a unique need for support in the Black community, yet national data shows many African American communities are woefully under-resourced and underrepresented in behavioral health care. The past year has exacerbated these challenges. The pandemic has disproportionately affected African Americans, and the repeated instances of racial injustice and police brutality have led to an increased need for mental health services in the Black community.

The Confess Project’s mission is to bridge the gaps in mental health care by providing a safe space for people to talk openly about the struggles they face. In turn, it has created a network of support among the barbers. Since it began in 2016, the Barber Coalition has spread to sixteen cities across the Southeast and Midwest and trained more than 200 barbers to be mental health advocates for their communities.

Coronavirus has forced much of its outreach online but has also allowed them new opportunities for growth through an expanded digital presence. The group hosts online training courses, group support calls and individual check-ins for its member barbers to circumvent the lockdowns and social distancing guidelines the pandemic has brought on.

Read more on CNN.com.

Every third Monday in January, Americans pause to remember and celebrate the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Most people are familiar with his Civil Rights legacy that fundamentally changed the United States by ending segregation. This legacy includes the year-long Montgomery bus boycott in 1957, his support of the “Little Rock Nine” as they attempted to integrate schools in Little Rock, Arkansas, and the March on Washington in 1963, all of which culminated in the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965.

During this period, as the principal leader of the Civil Rights Movement, King was jailed 29 times for peaceful civil disobedience or on trumped up charges. He spent the last 13 years of his life under constant threat of physical harm.

As familiar as most people are with this history, most people remain unaware that while King was transforming our nation he did so while battling mental illness.

From childhood, he experienced great highs and lows. A brilliant student, he skipped his freshman and senior years of high school before enrolling at Morehouse College at the age of 15. However, during this same period, following the death of his beloved grandmother, he also attempted suicide twice.

As an adult, King experienced bouts of severe depression. The stigma against individuals with mental illness, which we still battle today, was even more pronounced in the 1950s and 1960s. Concerned that people opposed to the Civil Rights Movement would use it as a way to try to discredit him, his incidents of depression remained a closely held secret among family, friends, and aides during his lifetime.

The stigma that forced King to keep secret his experience with depression still negatively affects millions of people throughout the United States and thousands of people here in St. Clair County. Although there have never been more effective mental health interventions available than there are today, many individuals with mental illness continue to deny themselves the care they need.

Citing stereotypes depicting people with mental illness as being dangerous, unpredictable, responsible for their illness, or generally incompetent, the number one reason given by a majority of individuals who did not seek out treatment was fear of friends, family, co-workers, and neighbors learning of their mental illness.

As we celebrate King, let us work to extend his Civil Rights legacy to all individuals, including those with mental illness, intellectual / developmental health issues, and substance use disorders.

Social networks, including family members, friends, and coworkers, can have a positive or negative impact on people’s decisions to pursue treatment, either enhancing feelings of stigma or encouraging individuals to seek treatment.

So, let’s all take a moment to think about the life-affirming example of King, who never let his depression stop him from positively answering what he said was life’s most persistent and urgent question: “What are you doing for others?”

Read more on the TimesHerald.com.

Telehealth use was highest for mental-health services as pandemic social-distancing guidelines accelerated the use of remote health-care services last spring, a new analysis shows — suggesting that “prospects for an expanded role for telehealth may be better for behavioral health care.”

About 48% of people who were being treated for some condition when the pandemic struck said they had used telehealth, according to a study by researchers at RAND, a think tank. Nearly 54% of patients with a behavioral-health condition used telehealth between mid-March and early May, while 43% of people with a chronic physical health condition did the same.

Video use in telehealth visits was more common for behavioral health conditions (30%) than it was for physical health conditions (14%), found the study, which was published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine. Most people opted to see their own doctor rather than a different physician.

Women were less likely than men to use telehealth for behavioral health conditions, as were white people compared to Black people, people 60 and older compared to younger people, and people with less than a high-school education compared to college degree holders. 

“If telehealth use is going to remain high, we need to ensure equity of access, particularly for behavioral health care where education, age, and gender were all associated with levels of use,” lead study author Shira Fischer, a physician researcher at RAND, said in a statement.

Fischer and her colleagues analyzed results from the RAND American Life Panel survey, which included data from 2,052 respondents who were paid for their participation. The study, which included a sample representative of U.S. adults aged 20 and older, was fielded from May 1 to May 6.

Previous studies have also revealed disparities in telehealth access during the pandemic. Researchers who examined medical records from 148,402 patients in the early months of COVID-19, for example, found that older people, non-English speakers and Asian people used telemedicine at lower rates, according to the study published in the journal JAMA Network Open.

Meanwhile, a combination of health concerns, unemployment, substance use, isolation and general anxiety — not to mention preexisting mental-health conditions — could be negatively impacting people’s mental health during the pandemic. 

The government has expanded access to telehealth services during the COVID-19 crisis, and some mental-health professionals say now might be an opportune time to try teletherapy. 

“There’s evidence that shows that telehealth can be as effective as in-person treatment in many instances,” Christine Moutier, the chief medical officer of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, told MarketWatch in March.

For those who are seeking mental-health services but don’t know where to begin, experts suggest looking to a local crisis center for guidance on accessing therapy, as well as checking out employee-assistance programs (EAPs) offered through the workplace. 

People who have employer-based health insurance can check the list of providers available through their plan, in addition to databases maintained by the American Psychological Association and American Psychiatric Association. Online therapy services like Talkspace and BetterHelp are also available.

Read more on MarketWatch.com.

In a year that saw the closing of businesses, skyrocketing unemployment and ongoing hate incidents concurrent with the public health crisis, the severity of Asian Americans’ struggles has been minimized at best or gone unnoticed at worst, experts say.

Many trace the invisibility of the community’s challenges, in part, to the mythical characterization of the racial group as compliant, successful and faring well — tropes that have long obscured the reality of their struggles.

Asian Americans are the racial group least likely to reach out for help. And that fact — coupled with an already existing belief that AAPIs don’t struggle — has only exacerbated pandemic-related problems for the community.

The group is roughly three times less likely than whites to seek mental health help. While Asian Americans report fewer mental health conditions than their white counterparts, they are more likely to consider and attempt suicide.

“Especially when you when you talk about the invisibility of some of their issues, in a sense, it’s almost a self-fulfilling prophecy,” Richelle Concepcion, president of the Asian American Psychological Association, told NBC Asian America.

Concepcion explained: “If they see that it’s not being discussed in their communities, and then that’s reflected on anything that they see in the mainstream media about which communities are affected, they feel discouraged about raising their voices. It still goes back to not wanting to make waves despite seeing that there are disparities within their community.”

For many Asian Americans, asking for help, despite how difficult this year’s circumstances have been for them, can feel like a mentally insurmountable barrier due to the pressures and expectations that the model minority myth has set, D.J. Ida, executive director of nonprofit National Asian American Pacific Islander Mental Health Association, said.

Other more general struggles like grief and social isolation can feel uniquely painful for those in the Asian American community, Han said. There’s a limited knowledge about mental health in the predominantly immigrant community, particularly because of the stigma associated with seeking assistance.

“The pandemic is really like being in a pressure cooker; it just gets heavier and heavier and heavier,” she said. “So we need more to have conversations to raise awareness and show, ‘I’m not alone. I don’t have to do it myself. I’m not selfish.’ It’s one of the things that we were training people when we do community training. We are so trained to sacrifice for the family, particularly Asian women, that we feel selfish. In order to be really, really good daughter, wife, sister, whatever, take care of yourself so you can take care of others.”

Read more on NBCNews.com.

U.S. suicide rates vary widely across racial and ethnic groups in ways that can upend expectations. The explanations may suggest avenues for prevention. Suicide in America has been rising for two decades, with rates for white Americans consistently well above those for Asian-Americans, Black Americans and Hispanics.

In data released in 2017, the rate for white Americans was around 19 per 100,000, and it was about 7.1 for both Hispanics and Asian-Americans/Pacific Islanders, and 6.6 for Black Americans, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Emotional and social stress is associated with suicide. From this, a puzzle emerges.

Because of pervasive racism, Black Americans experience substantial stress, fewer opportunities for advancement and more threats to well-being. These negative experiences can degrade mental and physical health, as well as limit education, employment and income — all of which can increase suicide risk. Unemployment, which is higher for Black Americans than white Americans, is itself a source of stress. Yet the Black suicide rate is about one-third that of whites.

“Social stressors — lower socioeconomic status and racism among them — are more prevalent and severe for the Black population than the white one,” said Joshua Breslau, a senior behavioral and social scientist at RAND. “But suicide and some risk factors for it, like mental health conditions, are less prevalent in the Black population. This is puzzling.”

One explanation may be a racial disparity in suicide data. Ian Rockett, an epidemiologist with West Virginia University, studies mortality data. “Because suicides can be difficult to prove, many may be misclassified as undetermined intent or accidents,” he said. “This problem is greater for Black Americans than white Americans.”

But misclassification cannot fully explain the racial difference in suicide. Other factors may help protect Black Americans from suicide, despite conditions that would seem to place them at higher risk. Dawne Mouzon, a sociologist and associate professor at Rutgers University, suggested that religious involvement is one source of protection. Black Americans overwhelmingly identify as Christian. “Because of their faith, Black Americans are more likely to believe suicide precludes reaching heaven after death,” she said.

Read more on the NewYorkTimes.com.