The US Needs a New Suicide Prevention Plan That Tackles Social Media and AI

The United States is racing to roll out machines that don’t care if our kids live or die, but our strategy to combat the nation’s suicide crisis doesn’t adequately reflect it.

Artificial intelligence and social media are not neutral tools. They are shaping how an entire generation sees itself and the world around it, with research linking heavy social media use to higher rates of anxiety, depression and suicide among young people.

Now, AI chatbots are entering that same space with potentially even greater power and less accountability.

The story of sixteen-year-old Adam Raine, who died by suicide after interacting with OpenAI’s ChatGPT, shows what is at stake, but he is not the only one. Around the world, parents and lawmakers are raising alarm about the psychological harm these technologies can cause and how quickly they are advancing beyond oversight or regulation.

Yet our national response largely treats technology as a tool to be managed, not a threat to be confronted. The same companies that once insisted their algorithms were relatively harmless are now repeating the pattern with AI, promising guardrails, downplaying harm and deflecting responsibility while vulnerable children become their test subjects.

I should know this as a signatory to the most recent National Strategy for Suicide Prevention in 2024 that failed to recognize this truth.

The document, meant to guide our nation’s approach to saving lives over the next decade, was a well-intentioned effort, supported by smart and caring people seeking to create a unified path forward in the fight against suicide in the US.

First introduced in 2001 through bipartisan collaboration and since supported by both Republican and Democratic administrations, the strategy has been updated roughly every ten years — in 2012 and again in 2024 — to align federal, state and community partners around shared goals to reduce suicide nationwide.

But intentions, even the best ones, are not enough.

To be clear, my criticism is not directed at the individuals or organizations who led the effort to create the plan, but rather with the limits of the process itself, and with my own failure to challenge them when I had the chance.

I signed the National Strategy for Suicide Prevention (NCSP) as a member of the National Council for Suicide Prevention, and I wish I hadn’t, knowing now what we do about the rapid expansion and impact of artificial intelligence on the health, wellness, and safety of youth. My criticism isn’t directed at the people or organizations who helped create it. They are dedicated professionals committed to saving lives. My concern is that the strategy itself already feels outdated.

It doesn’t reflect the reality our kids are growing up in. Social media, artificial intelligence, and the technologies shaping how young people see themselves aren’t side issues. They are at the center of the storm. A national plan that fails to confront them isn’t a strategy; it’s a missed opportunity.

Frankly, a ten-year strategy in an era of technology advancing at the speed of change itself is something we need to reassess.

But after signing it, I wrote to the leadership of the NCSP and shared the following points that I felt should have been more strongly articulated:

• Strong statements regarding age-appropriate design code for social media platforms and holding social media companies accountable for their products.
• A clear and unequivocal statement regarding the need to condemn hate speech directed at the LGBTQ+ community, and other marginalized communities, especially during the (then) upcoming national election.
• A strong and unambiguous call for greater funding at all levels of government to support mental health programs and suicide prevention strategies.

While there were references in the national strategy about some of the areas, I felt it important to clarify that they needed further emphasis.

In hindsight, I should have done more and said more. The truth is, more needs to be done.

If we’re serious about saving lives, we have to stop tiptoeing around our most nascent problems. The threat isn’t coming. It’s already here.

The latest national strategy, for all its strengths, still reflects an older framework for understanding suicide risk. It talks frequently about “risk factors” and “protective factors,” about “collaboration” and “community partnerships.” These remain vital, but they are not sufficient for the reality our children face today.

What’s missing is a full acknowledgment of the digital environments where so much of youth life now unfolds, which is not the main focus of any of the plan’s four main “strategic directions” or its 16 primary “goals.”

Every day, algorithms on social media platforms study our kids ever more closely, at times tracking their attention, rewarding their insecurities and shaping their emotions in ways no previous generation has faced.

To its credit, the strategy acknowledges “youth and social media” as “national priorities” and cites the US surgeon general’s 2023 advisory calling for, as the plan put it, “urgent action to create safer, healthier online environments to protect children.”

But acknowledgement isn’t action. The advisory, issued nearly a year before the national strategy’s release, warned that “we do not have enough evidence to conclude that [social media] is sufficiently safe” for children and urged that “now is the time to act swiftly and decisively to protect children and adolescents from risk of harm.” Those statements could have and should have been reflected in the strategy itself.

When it comes to firearms, it calls for concrete action. When it comes to social media, the main digital force shaping childhood, it calls for study and discussion. Every month spent studying is another month kids remain unprotected.

We can do better. We must do better.

If we recognize the lethality of firearms as a national public health issue, we must also recognize the psychological danger of systems that amplify despair, comparison and isolation for profit. The harms of social media and the unchecked influence of artificial intelligence — which is never mentioned in the current plan — deserve the same urgency, specificity and accountability that the strategy rightly assigns to the harms of firearms.

This is not a call to discard the national strategy. There is a great deal of good in the document.

However, it is time for us to reopen and amend it, with urgency and humility. That means incorporating the growing body of research on digital harms, elevating the voices of parents, educators, clinicians, survivors and youth themselves, and ensuring that suicide prevention policy reflects the technological landscape shaping young minds every day.

Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has the opportunity to lead this effort. With a new surgeon general poised for confirmation, he can direct the federal health agencies to reopen and strengthen the strategy so it explicitly addresses how social media and artificial intelligence are contributing to rising rates of suicidal thoughts, behaviors and deaths among young people. This is not simply a matter of mental health; it is a matter of suicide prevention on a national scale.

A modernized plan should:

• treat social media and AI as core, not peripheral, drivers of youth suicide risk;
• establish measurable goals for digital safety research, platform accountability and public education;
• foster national coordination among public health, technology, education, and child development sectors.
• commit to annual reviews and updates to the strategy rather than waiting another decade to adapt to a changing world; and
• hold Big Tech accountable for the safety and well-being of the children and families their products reach.

This is how we bring the strategy forward, not by assigning blame, but by advancing courage.

Suicide prevention has always demanded compassion, science and bravery. Today, it also demands honesty about the world our children now inhabit.

My signature on the strategy reflected hope. My regret reflects responsibility.

Almost a year ago, I failed to take the stand I should have before the National Strategy for Suicide Prevention was unveiled. I can’t undo that. But I can make sure it doesn’t happen again.

It’s time to reopen it, to face what we missed, and to save the lives still at risk.