RELIGION —
Anxiety is a serious issue in our world today. In this five-part series we’re exploring this problem as well as the difference faith in God can make.
Anxiety seems to be everywhere! Every day we hear reports, stories and statistics about it. It’s like the pandemic came along and took the lid off our anxiety jar and everything started spilling out. But that perception isn’t entirely accurate.
According to research conducted by The American Psychiatric Association and The U.K. Council for Psychotherapy in 2017 (three years before the pandemic), one-third of respondents reported an increase in anxiety. The World Health Organization reported a 25% increase in anxiety and depression during the first year of the pandemic. If you’re keeping score, that’s an almost 60% spike in four years!
The U.S. Preventative Services Task Force recently recommended that everyone from 8 years and up be regularly screened for symptoms of anxiety. Speaking of our children, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that almost 14% of our children have suffered from anxiety or depression. Medical News Today reports that anxiety affects about 40 million people in the U.S. — almost one out of every five people. Anxiety is on the rise!
But there’s more to the story. There are at least a couple of interesting things to note about this swift rise in our anxiety index. The first is that there is a disproportionate number of people in their 30s and below who are affected. We might have thought that it would be higher among the elderly, but that’s not where the bulge appears — it’s in the millennials and younger (Generation Z). The second item is that anxiety affects the affluent more. The more you have, the more susceptible you are to anxiety. Again, I’m not sure that’s what we expected to find.
That’s a quick overview of anxiety, but I think it’s sufficient to give us a grasp on the scope of the problem. How did we get to this point and more important — how do we get past it?
In this article I’ve shared the not-so-good news. Next week, in Part Three, we’ll start to look at the good news of how faith in God can make a difference.
You can find more of Bruce’s writings at his website: a-taste-of-grace-with-bruce-green.com