From CNN authored by Veronica Stracqualursi & Amanda Watts:
“The Federal Communications Commission has proposed a three-digit number for the National Suicide Prevention Hotline: 988.
The federal agency’s staff made the recommendation this week in a report to Congress, finding that using a shorter and easier to remember number “would likely make it easier for Americans in crisis to access potentially life-saving resources.”
The push for change comes as America’s suicide rates are at the highest level since World War II, with an increase of 33% from 1999 to 2017 alone, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Annual research published in June by the agency’s National Center for Health Statistics foundsuicide rates among people 15 to 64 climbed significantly during that period, rising from 10.5 per 100,000 people in 1999 to 14 per 100,000 in 2017, the most recent year with available data.”
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