Americans Are Gobbling Anti-Anxiety Meds Due to Coronavirus

So I’ve been trying to do the whole “stay calm, practice mindfulness, journal your feelings” thing during quarantine. And then I saw this report from Express Scripts and honestly? Im not surprised at all that everyone else just went straight to the pharmacy.

Prescriptions for anti-anxiety meds jumped 34 percent between mid-February and mid-March. Thirty four percent. In one month. Thats not a trend thats a collective nervous breakdown.

The data comes from Express Scripts’ America’s State of Mind report, which tracked prescription fills among about 31 million commercially insured people. And the timing is… well its exactly what you’d expect. The spike peaked during the week of March 15th, right when the WHO declared COVID-19 a pandemic and states started telling everyone to stay home.

Heres the thing that got me though — women are requesting these medications at almost double the rate of men. Anti-anxiety prescriptions for women went up 39.6 percent compared to 22.7 percent for men. And I have some thoughts about why that might be but I’ll just say… women are often the ones managing households, childcare, aging parents, AND working from home simultaneously. So. Yeah.

Antidepressants and sleep medications also spiked — 18.6 percent and 14.8 percent respectively. Which makes sense because anxiety, depression, and insomnia are basically a package deal at this point. You cant sleep because youre anxious, youre depressed because youre exhausted, its a whole cycle.

What’s kind of wild is that before the pandemic, anti-anxiety medication use had actually been declining for five years. Like we were collectively getting better at managing stress? Or at least not medicating it? And then March 2020 happened and undid all of that in about two weeks.

Dr. Glen Stettin from Express Scripts told CNN that its “understandable given the sudden and significant stress” everyone is experiencing. Which, yes. Obviously. But I think we need to talk more about why we’re all so fragile that one month of uncertainty broke us this badly.

Im not judging anyone for getting help, to be clear. Medication can be life-saving and necessary. But maybe this is also a sign that we need better mental health infrastructure overall? Just a thought.

If youre struggling, please reach out to someone. The SAMHSA National Helpline is 1-800-662-4357 and its free, confidential, and available 24/7.