Disease Control And Prevention

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a summary report yesterday detailing how the CDC measures mental illness in the U.S., and summary statistics from those measurements. Most of the information summarized in the report is not new, since it was previously published. What the report does do is bring a great deal of this information together in a single paper.

The report notes that according to the World Health Organization, mental illness — that is, any mental disorder — accounts for more disability in developed countries than any other group of illnesses, including cancer and heart disease. Yet all we hear people talk about in the media time and time again is reducing your risk of these health problems. We rarely hear anyone talk about reducing your risk of anxiety or depression.

According to a rigorous health survey conducted by the CDC in 2004, an estimated 25 percent of adults in the U.S. reported having a mental illness in the previous year. Lifetime prevalence rates of mental illness in the U.S. were around 50 percent when measured back in 2004. That means in a family of four, one of you likely has a mental illness.

However, mental illness is greatly weighted toward our senior years, when things start looking pretty bleak.