3 SIMPLE STEPS FOR THE PRIVATE SECTOR TO LEAD US OUT OF THE MENTAL HEALTH CRISIS
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efore the pandemic, Utah’s rates of depression exceeded the national average. Since the pandemic began, mental health challenges at home and across the nation have only increased.
From 2019 to 2020, nationwide symptoms of anxiety tripled (from 8.1% to 25.5%), and depression symptoms nearly quadrupled (from 6.5% to 24.3%). Call volume to the University Neuropsychiatric Institute increased nearly 25% in May 2020. But there’s good news: never before has there been such a concerted effort from business, government, and non-profit leaders to prevent suicide and improve the mental and emotional well-being of Utahns.
non-profit organizations like Room Here, dedicated to normalizing the conversation around mental health by wisely reframing it as “mental fitness.”
In addition, Utah Community Builders — the Salt Lake Chamber’s non-profit social impact foundation — launched a new statewide initiative in late 2020 called “Workforce Resilience through Mental Fitness.” Leaders in mental health, advocates and experts in clinical care and upstream wellness, and pioneering CEOs have joined together in this campaign to empower Utah businesses to improve the mental fitness of their employees.
A hallmark piece of this initiative is the new “Suicide Prevention in the Workforce Employer Toolkit,” created in partnership with the Take for example the Huntsman Utah Department of Health, Utah family’s $150 million commitment Department of Human Services, NAMI in 2019 to improving mental health Utah, the Utah Suicide Prevention through the establishment of the Huntsman Mental Health Institute. Or Coalition, and Live On. This toolkit the state’s new Live On Utah campaign, gives businesses helpful information and resources for crisis intervention, driven by the Utah Suicide Prevention as well as midstream and upstream Coalition to provide crisis resources preventative efforts. statewide. Or the creation of new 52
LIFE IN UTAH 2021 | SLCHAMBER.com
Utah Community Builders and the Salt Lake Chamber also partnered with groups like Blunovus and SafeLane Health to offer Chamber members exclusive free or discounted access to a library of wellness content, employee mental health assessment tools, and more.
The goal is simple: for each business in Utah to take steps today to help uplift the mental fitness of their employees. The impact is tremendous: creating a culture of mental fitness in the workplace can help save lives by preventing suicide — but it also has untold benefits for all of Utah’s workforce through better mental and emotional health. This positively affects the workplace, but also ripples through our families, communities and entire state. So, if you’re a business leader not sure where to start, review the Suicide in the Workforce Prevention Toolkit and other Workforce Resilience through Mental Fitness content, and consider these three simple steps:
