AAPI LGBTQ youths face a higher risk of mental health challenges and suicide, a new report from the Trevor Project shows.
The Trevor Project, an LGBTQ advocacy group, found in their survey released on Tuesday that 40% of AAPI LGBTQ youths seriously considered suicide in the past year, NBC News reported. Pacific Islander/Native Hawaiian youths experienced it at the highest rate of 49%, followed by Korean American youths at 47%, and Filipino American youths at 41%.
The report also shows that more than half of AAPI LGBTQ youths experienced discrimination based on their race in the last year, according to NBC News. The youths who did experience prejudice because of race or immigration status showed higher rates of suicide attempts.
“These findings shine a light on the unique mental health outcomes and suicide risk of AAPI LGBTQ youth — a demographic that has largely been overlooked by the research world,” Myeshia Price, a senior research scientist at the Trevor Project, said in a statement about the study, according to Them magazine.
Kevin Wong, the vice president of communications at Trevor Project, told NBC News that the data conveys the lack of mental health-related support for AAPI youths of the LGBTQ community.
“These data points show a critical need to invest in — whether it’s resources or suicide prevention efforts — for youth that are culturally responsive and reflect those diverse identities,” Wong said to NBC News.
Pauline Park, a Korean American transgender activist and coordinator of a transgender support group at Queens Pride House in Queens, New York, told NBC News that this report does not come as a surprise.
“There’s a general sense in AAPI communities that Asians don’t go to seek mental health services, that ‘it’s a white thing,’” said Park. “Most social services and mental health services are not targeted to queer AAPI youth. … We need more providers who speak languages of queer AAPIs, whose first language may not be English.”
Nearly 3,600 AAPI youth aged between 13 and 24 were represented in the survey, according to Them magazine. The data was further broken down by the ethnic groups that fall under that category.
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