A new study from UCLA Health and UC San Diego Health has identified a disturbing rise in suicidal thoughts, planning and attempts among Americans aged 50 and older in the years following the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings, published in the Journal of Affective Disorders, suggest that existing prevention strategies may be overlooking many older adults at risk.
Researchers analyzed responses from nearly 42,500 people age 50 and above who took part in the National Survey on Drug Use and Health between 2021 and 2024. Across that period, suicidal ideation rose by 42.6%, while reported suicide planning increased 256.2% and attempts climbed 263.3%.
The study’s lead author, Dr. Kevin Yang, is a psychiatrist and researcher associated with UCLA’s National Clinician Scholars Program and Fielding School of Public Health. The research was conducted while Yang was a resident psychiatrist at UC San Diego Health, with support from the National Institute on Drug Abuse and UC San Diego’s Sam and Rose Stein Institute for Research on Aging. The institutions’ research summary says the sharpest increases in suicidal thinking and planning appeared among people without familiar warning signs such as major depression or recent alcohol use.
That result could force a broader conversation about how suicide risk is assessed in older patients. Depression screening remains important, but the researchers point to social isolation, loneliness, bereavement, financial pressure and frailty as additional factors that may need more attention. Suicide planning also rose more steeply among older adults who reported cannabis use in the previous year, increasing 449.9% compared with 188.3% among those who did not report such use. The finding signals an association worth investigating, not proof that cannabis caused the increase.
The authors stress that the results are exploratory. Because the survey offers a snapshot rather than long-term follow-up, it cannot establish why the numbers changed or prove that the pandemic directly caused the rise. Responses were self-reported, institutionalized people were excluded, and the number of reported attempts was relatively small at 113. The survey also cannot include people who died by suicide, meaning the figures may understate the overall burden.
For clinicians, families and community organizations, the message is that a lack of diagnosed depression should not be treated as evidence that an older person is safe. The researchers call for continued monitoring and wider assessments that look beyond traditional psychiatric risk factors, along with more research into how older adults move from suicidal thoughts to concrete plans. Anyone in the United States experiencing a mental-health crisis, or worried about someone else, can call or text 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at any time.
