Growing up, one of my claims to fame was that my dad was on the TV show “Rescue 911.”
For those unfamiliar with 1990s TV programming, “Rescue 911” was a show hosted by William Shatner (Captain Kirk himself) where real people replicated real 911 calls. The stories included a girl who nearly drowned in a washing machine, a boy who was attacked by an alligator, and a trucker whose brakes failed while driving down a steep mountain road.
My dad’s emergency involved a snowmobile accident near Island Park, Idaho. The way it happened in real life was that a snowmobiler hit a tree head-on. Shortly after, my dad and a friend came across the wreckage and then drove several miles to the nearest town where they called 911 from a pay phone. TV dramatization was much more, well, dramatic. Engines rev, powder flies, and an absurd number of slow-motion shots of their sleds looking serious. My dad, who is a bit of a show-off when it comes to his Ski-Doo skills, did all his stunts himself. We haven’t heard the end of it for months (never mind that it was overshadowed by another hero highlighted in the same episode – a policeman who performed CPR on a choking Dalmatian) .
My dad couldn’t meet William Shatner – a real disappointment. Still, I loved bragging to all my friends that he was a real hero, even if it was just by rolling over to a phone and dialing 911.
There’s probably no way of knowing how many lives the 911 service has saved over the years. Since its inception as a nationwide number in the late 1960s, it has connected people to the nearest police, fire department and ambulance as simply and quickly as possible. After all, the last thing you want to do when your house is on fire is search for a 10-digit phone number.
And yet, until last weekend, that’s exactly what people in the midst of a mental health crisis had to do. Either they had to find the number of a crisis hotline, or they took a chance and called 911. Although, of course, 911 is meant to help, when it comes to of a mental health crisis, you might find yourself transported to an emergency room that is ill-equipped to help. Worse still, you could end up in the custody of law enforcement, all because of a call for help that was misdirected to agencies with no training or resources to properly handle them.
As of Saturday, we officially have the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. By dialing just three numbers, you are connected to one of over 100 crisis call centers across the country. The service isn’t as sophisticated as the 911 network – rather than routing calls based on geography, they’re based on the area code. Either way, it’s a streamlined way to connect people with the right kind of help, faster.
It’s a big problem – a problem we can all support in the following way.
First, we can spread the word. The number 988 and what it has to offer should be as well known as its big sister 911.
Second, we can push for perpetual funding. The federal government invested heavily to launch the program. States can pass legislation to add a small fee to cell phone bills to cover ongoing 988 expenses, similar to funding 911 services. Washington is one of four states to have already done so. . We can pressure Idaho lawmakers to ignore powerful lobbying efforts and implement minimal and reasonable fees to maintain and even expand 988 services in the state.
And third, we can use that momentum to ask for more. We are currently facing an unprecedented national mental health crisis. It is time that our mental and emotional health services matched our physical health services. What if we had universal mental health care – affordable (or better yet, free) access to psychiatric counseling and care. What if we built an army of mental health practitioners, imbued with as many resources as our armed forces.
None of these actions are as exciting as riding a snowmobile at 100 mph for help, nor are they likely to land you in a TV show hosted by William Shatner. But they will save lives – potentially many of them, most likely the lives of people you love.
Stellmon set sail for a three-hour excursion on the Palouse in 2001. She is now happily marooned in Moscow with his wife and five children.
