Health

(NEW YORK) — Shalon Irving knew her newborn daughter Soleil for less than one month.

Three weeks after giving birth to Soleil, now 6, Shalon Irving, who is Black, died from complications of high blood pressure on Jan. 28, 2017 .

“My daughter had wanted a child more than anything on this earth,” Wanda Irving, Shalon Irving’s mother and Soleil’s grandmother, said in an interview with ABC News. “Soleil came to me and said, ‘Nonna, I want to die because I want to go where my mommy is. That’s the only way I’m going to get there.'”

Shalon Irving is part of a growing group of individuals, particularly Black women, dying from pregnancy-related complications several weeks or months after childbirth.

After her daughter’s death, Wanda Irving founded Dr. Shalon’s Maternal Action Project, an organization devoted to connecting Black women to resources and information about maternal mortality.

Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows Black women die during and just after pregnancy at a rate 2.6 times that of white women.

A recent CDC report found the majority of maternal mortality cases — about 53% — occur after the first week of childbirth. Maternal deaths occur up to a year after delivery.

The causes vary based on race, with Hispanic and white women more likely to die from mental health conditions and Black women more likely to die from cardiac conditions, like the high blood pressure complications that killed Shalon Irving.

While every case is unique, CDC researchers estimated more than 80% of those deaths are preventable. Dr. Kamilah Dixon , a board-certified OB-GYN and maternal mortality expert at Ohio State University, said more awareness is needed.

“We still have to make sure that we are vigilant [even after childbirth],” Dixon told ABC News. “A lot of people think, ‘OK, we did it. All the risk is gone, and we don’t have to worry anymore.'”

One of the risks long after delivery is death from mental health conditions, which is the leading cause of maternal mortality overall, the CDC report found.

That includes deaths from suicide and accidental drug overdose. Blood loss is the second leading cause of pregnancy-related deaths.

The ongoing opioid addiction crisis in the U.S. contributes to the high rate of deaths from mental health conditions, said Dixon.

She said access to overdose-reversing drugs like Narcan is important to combat these deaths. Access to doulas and midwives could serve as mental and emotional support for individuals during pregnancy and after pregnancy.

Attention to cardiac health is key for Black women, who have the highest overall maternal mortality rates overall and are most at risk from heart conditions.

While the data doesn’t explain why pregnant Black women are more likely to die from cardiac conditions, CDC data from 2019 found Black Americans were 30% more likely to die from heart disease than their white counterparts.

Structural racism also plays a role in the stark inequities in maternal mortality, according to Dixon, who said differences between the types of conditions and issues affecting different demographic groups make it difficult to tackle the issue in a consistent way.

“I think it’s important to … understand what’s happening in particular communities so we can really target that,” she said, noting that different groups might need different types of interventions.

Still, big-picture policy changes can also play a role in driving change.

Congress passed a law in 2021 expanding Medicaid coverage for pregnant people from about two months to up to one year after childbirth, which will make resources more accessible to pregnant individuals.

“People need to know this is a problem we have here in the U.S.,” Dixon said. “I’ve had many patients in my office who’ve told me that they’ve chosen not to get pregnant because they don’t want to die.”

While pregnancy-related deaths are rare, individuals who want to become pregnant should be aware of the risks, according to David Goodman, Ph.D., a maternal mortality expert at the CDC.

“Be informed. Make sure that you are working with providers that you trust and have a relationship with,” Goodman told ABC News. “Don’t be afraid to walk away and find another provider as much as you are able.”

Home births are also on the rise, but Dixon and Goodman stressed that childbirths performed outside the hospital are riskier.

They said home births are unlikely to be a safe alternative for many pregnant people, who should consult their medical provider to discuss the options that might be safest for them.

In the meantime, families affected by pregnancy-related deaths, like Shalon Irving’s family, are taking their own steps to combat the problem.

Through the organization named for her late daughter, Wanda Irving helped create Believe Her , an app that provides maternal health resources for Black women and gives them a space to share their experiences.

Wanda Irving underscored that policy work is important, but she said lawmakers need to address structural racism to combat maternal mortality.

“Our whole system — everything — our foundation of America is built on racism, on the backs of Black and brown people. We need to recognize that, accept that and change it,” she said.

She added, “If we don’t start holding doctors accountable for the way that Black women are treated in the medical system, nothing is going to change.”

Aisha Bowen, M.D., is a resident physician in family medicine from Grant Family Medicine and a member of the ABC News Medical Unit.

Michal Ruprecht is a medical student at Wayne State University School of Medicine and a member of the ABC News Medical Unit.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — The abortion pill mifepristone will remain on the market for now — but come Saturday morning, access should be severely restricted, a federal appeals court ruled late Wednesday in partially blocking a lower court order.

It’s a bittersweet victory for abortion rights advocates who feared the conservative 5th Circuit Court of Appeals would side with conservative plaintiffs in the case and force manufacturing and production of the drug mifepristone to stop entirely by Saturday morning. Instead, the three-judge panel is allowing the drug to stay on the market — for now — but with tough restrictions on the drug that haven’t been in place since 2000 when it was first approved and regulators wanted to monitor its safety more closely.

“We are going to continue to fight in the courts. We believe that the law is on our side and we will prevail,” said White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.

Abortion rights opponents said they were pleased with the decision because it paves the way for approval of the drug to be suspended entirely.

“We are very encouraged by this landmark win for women and girls. The Court recognized that the abortion pill is dangerous and rolled back Biden’s reckless mail-order abortion scheme,” said Katie Daniel, the state policy director for Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America.”

The Justice Department could still take the matter to the U.S. Supreme Court before the appeals court ruling takes effect.

But for now, the drug would be available only up to seven weeks instead of 10 weeks of pregnancy.

Three in-person office visits would be required: the first to administer mifepristone, the second to administer misoprostol — which causes the pregnancy to be expelled — and the third to assess any complications and ensure there were no fetal remains in the womb.

It would require the supervision of a qualified physician and the reporting of all adverse events from the drugs.

Overall, it would roll back every win the abortion rights movement had on this drug in the past two decades.

“The FDA followed decades of science and evidence when it expanded access to mifepristone — a court with no medical experts that has a long history of extremist rulings on abortion has no place taking that away,” said Kirsten Moore, director of the Expanding Medication Abortion Access (EMMAA) Project.

While the appeals court’s decision is temporary while it considers the merits of the case, the panel of judges signaled it was sympathetic to conservative arguments made in the lawsuit, calling the Food and Drug Administration rules around mifepristone “exceedingly unusual” because they allow patients to obtain the drug without seeing a doctor in person.

“Because applicants chose to cut out doctors from the prescription and administration of mifepristone, plaintiff doctors and their associations will necessarily be injured by the consequences. This is an exceedingly unusual regime. In fact, as far as the record before us reveals, FDA has not structured the distribution of any comparable drug in this way,” the panel of appeals court judges wrote.

Danco Labs, which produces the brand name version of the drug Mifeprex, said the FDA’s decisions in recent years to loosen regulation of the drug were based on safety and efficacy data.

“FDA has been empowered by Congress to make decisions about what drugs are safe and effective and how they should be available to patients,” the company wrote in a statement. “Danco remains unchanged in its commitment to do all that we can to support and protect the availability of and access to Mifeprex for healthcare providers and all people in the United States.”

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — One of only five people in the world to achieve full remission of HIV is stepping forward to share his story in an ABC broadcast exclusive.

Paul Edmonds’ journey into medical history began decades ago. He was diagnosed with AIDS in 1988 — a time when it was a potential death sentence. Thanks to his own perseverance and advances in treatment, he survived — even thrived — after his diagnosis.

Edmonds met his future husband Arnie House and convinced him to be tested. House also was HIV positive. As years past, better antiretroviral treatments brought both of their HIV levels to undetectable, which means the virus was untransmissable.

But for Edmonds, another diagnosis was looming. In 2018, he learned he had leukemia. Although his heart sank, Edmonds told ABC News’ Juju Chang, “I wasn’t ready to die.”

Edmonds and House sought care at City of Hope Medical Center in California. There, while undergoing treatment for leukemia, Edmonds’ doctors saw a unique opportunity to try to cure him of his HIV, too. After chemotherapy, Edmonds received a stem cell transplant from a donor with a mutation that makes them resistant to HIV. Stem cell transplants carry a significant risk in themselves, as they must be preceded by wiping out the whole immune system. During this time, which can be months, patients have to stay in protected areas of the hospital to reduce the risk of life-threatening infections.

“It’s a very rare mutation. It exists in roughly 1% of the population. So it’s not, it’s not something we find very commonly,” said Edmonds’ physician, Dr. Jana Dickter, City of Hope associate clinical professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine.

The transplant worked. Not only did Edmonds go into remission for his cancer, he also became the fifth person ever to go into remission from HIV. Now, four years after his transplant and two years after doctors took him off HIV medications, the virus shows no signs of coming back.

“We can’t find evidence of replicating HIV in his system,” Dickter said. “It’s been really amazing. It’s been such a journey.”

Dickter and her colleagues announced the details of Edmonds’ case in July 2022, but he was known anonymously as the “City of Hope patient” at the time. Now, he is stepping out of the shadows. He and his husband sat down with ABC’s Chang for an in-depth interview in their California home.

Edmonds said he still struggles to come to terms with being cured after living with HIV for more than three decades and after watching so many of his friends die of AIDS in the 1980s and 1990s.

“I was incredibly grateful. I’m grateful to be alive. I was grateful there was a donor,” he said.

House said he was thrilled when Edmonds’ HIV went into remission.

“I was so happy for him. Because it was like a liberation for me. That he didn’t have to take his HIV medications anymore – it was wonderful,” House said.

There is still no cure for most of the 1.2 million Americans living with HIV today. Rare cures happen only among people with HIV who are also diagnosed with certain types of cancer, and subsequently receive the unique stem cell transplant that cures their cancer and HIV simultaneously.

But scientists say Edmonds’ story is helping them get one step closer. His story is unique because his treatment was less medically intensive than prior cases, giving scientists hope that the procedure he received could be applicable to a wider range of HIV patients with cancer who are aging. At 66, Edmonds is the oldest person to be cured of HIV — and he had been living with HIV the longest.

Edmonds was able to receive a newer, less intensive chemotherapy regimen that City of Hope helped develop for older patients, and his transplant had only mild medical complications, according to Dr. Ahmed M. Aribi, assistant professor with City of Hope’s Division of Leukemia, Department of Hematology & Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation.

Although scientists are still searching for an HIV cure, significant medical advances mean people living with HIV are living longer and healthier lives. In fact, doctors say, modern medication is so effective that many people with HIV can lower the amount of virus in their blood to the point where it is impossible to pass the virus on to others, even after unprotected sex and other high-risk exposures.

Edmonds and House both urged everyone to get tested for HIV, because knowing your status can save a life. They said ignorance is the only killer.

“We have to go out, get tested. It’s so easy to be able to get put on medications. Have yourself followed by a doctor like me,” House said.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Suicides increased during the second year of the COVID-19 pandemic, new federal data shows.

There were 48,183 people who died by suicide in 2021, according to a report published Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

It comes after two consecutive years of declines and is an increase of 4.7% from the 45,979 deaths recorded in 2020. It’s also the highest number recorded since 2018, when 48,344 Americans died by suicide.

What’s more, the total rate hit 14.1 per 100,000, slightly less than the 14.2 per 100,000 in 2018.

It’s also a 4% increase from the rate in 2020 of 13.5 per 100,000 — the largest seen in two decades.

Both males and females saw an increase of 4% in suicide rates from 2020 to 2021.

The rate for males went up from 22.0 per 100,000 to 22.8 per 100,000 while the rate for females rose from 5.5 per 100,000 to 5.7 per 100,0000.

Males were found to be more greatly affected, with rates increasing for those aged 15 to 24, 25 to 44, 65 to 74, and 75 and older.

By comparison, the only significant increase for females was in the age group 75 and older, the report found.

However, both Black females and white females saw suicide rates significantly increase.

Black females saw rates rise by 14% from 2.9 per 100,000 to 3.3 per 100,000 while white females saw a 3% increase from 6.9 per 100,000 to 7.1 per 100,000.

Although the increase was not significant from 2020 to 2021 for American Indian or Alaskan Native women, they had the highest rate during the second year of the pandemic at 13.9 per 100,000.

In addition, in 2021, suicide was the 11th leading cause of death in the U.S. While this is higher than in 2020, when it was the 12th leading cause, it’s lower than in 2019, during which it was the 10th leading cause of death.

Specifically, it was the second leading cause of death for Americans between ages 10 to 34.

The report did not discuss why suicides increased in 2021, but research has shown the COVID-19 pandemic had a negative impact on mental health.

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, four in 10 U.S. adults reported symptoms of an anxiety or depressive disorder during the pandemic, an increase from one in 10 adults who reported similar symptoms from January 2019 to June 2019.

The impact on young adults was particularly severe. According to a 2021 study from Boston College, rates of depression and anxiety rose 61% and 65%, respectively, among those aged 18 to 29 during the first year of the pandemic. Both disorders are known to increase the risk of suicide.

Researchers are also studying if there is a link between long COVID-19 patients and higher rates of depression and suicidal thoughts.

If you are struggling with thoughts of suicide or worried about a friend or loved one, call the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 for free, confidential emotional support 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — A Texas baby has been discharged from the hospital and reunited with her twin sister and parents Amanda Arciniega and James Finley of Saginaw.

Baby AmieLynn was released from Cook Children’s Medical Center in Fort Worth, Texas, on Friday, nearly one month after her twin sister JamieLynn returned home.

The 6-month-old and her twin were formerly conjoined at the chest and faced each other. They also shared a liver.

The girls were born via cesarean section last October at Texas Health Harris Methodist Hospital Fort Worth and were transferred in November to the neonatal intensive care unit at Cook Children’s Medical Center.

In January, the girls were successfully separated after an 11-hour surgery at Cook Children’s that involved a team of 25 medical professionals. They made history as the first pair of conjoined twins to be separated at the medical center, according to the hospital.

JamieLynn was able to be released from Cook Children’s in March but AmieLynn was kept at the hospital for additional monitoring.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — A number of medical experts and health care officials are concerned about a rise in medical misinformation following the announcement by Democrat Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an anti-vaccine activist, that he is running for president in 2024.

Kennedy, the son of former U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, has become one of the most prominent faces of the anti-vaccine movement, according to experts. He is the founder of Children’s Health Defense, a nonprofit organization known mainly for its anti-vaccine efforts. The group was kicked off Instagram and Facebook last year for spreading misleading claims about vaccines and other public health measures.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the organization’s revenues doubled to $6.8 million, according to filings made with charity regulators.

Kennedy’s bid for the presidency “puts science squarely on the ballot,” said Brian Castrucci, president of De Beaumont Foundation, a group dedicated to advancing public health policy. “His campaigns make the benefits of vaccines a question up for debate rather than settled science.”

“His campaign would platform a set of dangerous beliefs with the possibility of not only harming the health of the public but the health of our communities and economy as well,” Castrucci told ABC News. “We would have a candidate who each day would be spreading scientific misinformation and, in the process, legitimizing vaccine hesitancy and resistance.”

Kennedy, whose vaccine skepticism stretches back to around the early 2000s, has yet to hold any public presidential campaign events or mention his anti-vaccine stance as a presidential candidate. But some experts ABC News spoke with expressed concerns about his previous efforts to push conspiracy theories and misleading claims about COVID-19 and vaccines.

“His name carries a lot of weight,” Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease doctor at the University of California San Francisco, told ABC News. “Anybody who is a leader of our country needs to be a voice of reason and somebody who stands up for science and does not discredit science.”

Hong said that one of his concerns about Kennedy is his attitude toward public health infrastructure and the necessary funding health care institutions need for future public health emergencies.

“If you don’t believe in vaccines, you’re probably not going to be sympathetic to funding many arms of public health,” said Hong. “Money talks in a pandemic, and if you’re not going to put funding resources and money behind what should be done, the whole country is going to fall flat.”

Dr. Nick Sawyer, an emergency medicine physician in Sacramento who founded No License for Disinformation, a group of doctors who came together during the pandemic to call on state medical boards to take disciplinary measures against doctors spreading misinformation, said that Kennedy represents “a huge threat.”

“He’s lying to people about critical things that have to do with our nation’s children’s health,” Sawyer told ABC News. “The health effects are incredibly dangerous and have already shown to be incredibly damaging.”

Last year, Kennedy’s nonprofit organization criticized Sawyer’s group for pushing a California bill that would strip licenses from doctors who spread COVID-19 misinformation. In a blog post on the Children’s Health Defense website, the group said the bill would remove doctors’ medical licenses “if they express medical views that the state does not agree with.”

“On the national level, we must also stay vigilant against similar legislative proposals, and push back against phony front groups that promote this kind of medical tyranny,” the blog post said. “This includes the No License for Disinformation group.”

Dr. Elizabeth Glowacki, a health communication researcher at Northeastern University, told ABC News she is worried about Kennedy targeting marginalized communities, after he produced an anti-vaccine film about the dangers of vaccines aimed at Black and Hispanic people during the pandemic.

“There are some serious health consequences if people don’t have accurate information about vaccines, in particular communities that are underserved and that are marginalized — communities that already have a structure that prevents them from accessing vaccines and resources,” Glowacki said.

Last month, Castrucci’s group, De Beaumont, published a poll that found that nearly three in four physicians said medical misinformation has hindered their ability to treat COVID-19 patients.

According to the poll, 44% of physicians estimate that more than half the COVID-19 information they see, read and hear from patients is misinformation.

“We see [misinformation] continuing, if not gaining momentum,” Castrucci told ABC News.

Representatives for Kennedy’s presidential campaign did not respond to a request for comment from ABC News.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — The number of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in the United States shows “no signs of slowing,” new federal data shows.

A total of 2.53 million cases of chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis were recorded in 2021, according to a new report published Tuesday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

That’s a 5.8% increase from the 2.39 million cases reported in 2020 and a 7% increase from five years ago when 2.37 million STIs were recorded in 2017.

While certain STIs did not reach pre-pandemic levels, others — such as syphilis — are recording the highest numbers seen in more than 70 years.

A total of 176,713 syphilis cases — for all stages of the infection — were recorded in 2021, the highest since the 217,558 cases reported in 1950 and a 32% increase from the 133,954 recorded the previous year, the report said.

The report also found that cases of congenital syphilis, which occurs when a baby is born with the infection after the mother passed it on during pregnancy, rose by 32% from 2,148 to more than 2,800. This resulted in 220 stillbirths and infant deaths in 2021, the agency said.

Meanwhile, gonorrhea rates increased 4% from 206.5 per 100,000 to 214.8 per 100,000. Rates of chlamydia — which make up the majority of STIs — also rose by about 4% from 481.3 per 100,000 to 500 per 100,000.

However, unlike gonorrhea and syphilis, reported cases of chlamydia did not return to pre-pandemic levels, the CDC said.

However, the CDC cautioned that because the disease is typically asymptomatic, these decreases were more likely due to COVID-19-related disruptions than to drops in infections.

According to the CDC, STIs fell rapidly during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly in March and April 2020, during shelter-in-place and stay-at-home orders.

This is due to reduced screenings because many health care clinics either closed or had limited in-person appointments in the early days of the pandemic, limited resources due to programs shifting to help combat COVID-19 and social distancing measures limiting sexual behaviors and activity.

In response, the federal health agency is calling for more action from health care and public health experts with a focus on STI prevention and innovation efforts.

This includes rebuilding and expanding local public health services to offer STI testing and treatments, making these testing and treatment options more accessible and advancing research to prevent STIs through vaccines or post-exposure prophylaxis.

“The U.S. STI epidemic shows no signs of slowing,” said Dr. Leandro Mena, director of the CDC’s division of STD prevention, in a statement. “The reasons for the ongoing increases are multifaceted — and so are the solutions. For the first time in decades, we’re seeing promising new STI interventions on the horizon, but these alone will not solve this epidemic.”

The statement continued, “It will take many of us working together to effectively use new and existing tools, to increase access to quality sexual healthcare services for more people, and to encourage ongoing innovation and prioritization of STI prevention and treatment in this country.”

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — The number of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in the United States shows “no signs of slowing,” new federal data shows.

A total of 2.53 million cases of chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis were recorded in 2021, according to a new report published Tuesday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

That’s a 5.8% increase from the 2.39 million cases reported in 2020 and a 7% increase from five years ago when 2.37 million STIs were recorded in 2017.

While certain STIs did not reach pre-pandemic levels, others — such as syphilis — are recording the highest numbers seen in more than 70 years.

A total of 176,713 syphilis cases — for all stages of the infection — were recorded in 2021, the highest since the 217,558 cases reported in 1950 and a 32% increase from the 133,954 recorded the previous year, the report said.

The report also found that cases of congenital syphilis, which occurs when a baby is born with the infection after the mother passed it on during pregnancy, rose by 32% from 2,148 to more than 2,800. This resulted in 220 stillbirths and infant deaths in 2021, the agency said.

Meanwhile, gonorrhea rates increased 4% from 206.5 per 100,000 to 214.8 per 100,000. Rates of chlamydia — which make up the majority of STIs — also rose by about 4% from 481.3 per 100,000 to 500 per 100,000.

However, unlike gonorrhea and syphilis, reported cases of chlamydia did not return to pre-pandemic levels, the CDC said.

However, the CDC cautioned that because the disease is typically asymptomatic, these decreases were more likely due to COVID-19-related disruptions than to drops in infections.

According to the CDC, STIs fell rapidly during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly in March and April 2020, during shelter-in-place and stay-at-home orders.

This is due to reduced screenings because many health care clinics either closed or had limited in-person appointments in the early days of the pandemic, limited resources due to programs shifting to help combat COVID-19 and social distancing measures limiting sexual behaviors and activity.

In response, the federal health agency is calling for more action from health care and public health experts with a focus on STI prevention and innovation efforts.

This includes rebuilding and expanding local public health services to offer STI testing and treatments, making these testing and treatment options more accessible and advancing research to prevent STIs through vaccines or post-exposure prophylaxis.

“The U.S. STI epidemic shows no signs of slowing,” said Dr. Leandro Mena, director of the CDC’s division of STD prevention, in a statement. “The reasons for the ongoing increases are multifaceted — and so are the solutions. For the first time in decades, we’re seeing promising new STI interventions on the horizon, but these alone will not solve this epidemic.”

The statement continued, “It will take many of us working together to effectively use new and existing tools, to increase access to quality sexual healthcare services for more people, and to encourage ongoing innovation and prioritization of STI prevention and treatment in this country.”

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — In the wake of Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman entering treatment for severe depression, four Democratic colleagues in Congress exclusively sat down with ABC News to share their support for him and his recovery while applauding his courage on the stigma-clouded topic, which has historically been associated with great political risk.

The four lawmakers — Sen. Tina Smith of Minnesota, Rep. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts, Rep. Ruben Gallego of Arizona and Rep. Ritchie Torres of New York — also spoke candidly about their own mental health battles, ranging from clinical depression to post-traumatic stress disorder, in the occasionally emotional interview.

Speaking out, as Torres told ABC’s Brittany Shepherd, is the best way forward.

“Telling our stories is a form of public service. We represent people who are deeply affected by mental health conditions like depression, anxiety, who want to see themselves and their elected officials,” he said. “And I felt like I had a profound obligation to confront the culture of silence and stigma and shame that often surrounds the subject of mental health.”

“Whether you are Republican or Democrat, progressive or conservative, Black or white, rich or poor, mental health is a universal experience that binds us together,” Torres said, “because it’s a human condition.”

Below are highlights from the conversation. See more from the interview on ABC News Live Prime:

Four personal journeys

In part prompted by Fetterman sharing details of his struggles — a lifelong history of depression that worsened dramatically early this year, his staff has said — the four lawmakers told ABC News about their mental health journeys.

Smith said she first experienced symptoms of depression during college, when she was in her late teens. She had another bout of depression as a young mom, when she was in her thirties.

But she said she got care and treatment during her college years and in her thirties worked with a therapist who diagnosed her with clinical depression and helped her heal “over time.”

Moulton, a Marine veteran, first disclosed that he had sought treatment for PTSD in the aftermath of his four combat deployments in Iraq, while he also ran for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination.

It took him a “while” to come to terms with the fact that he was suffering with the disorder, because he “didn’t have the worst symptoms,” he said.

“I would wake up in cold sweats and have terrible dreams, but I was able to go to graduate school, I was able to hold down a job. A lot of vets can’t even do those simple things,” he said, noting that when he did finally access treatment by way of regular therapy appointments, his condition improved.

“I still see a therapist on a regular basis because I think it’s a healthy thing to do. But I’ve really been able to pretty much eliminate the regular symptoms of post-traumatic stress that I have,” Moulton said.

Gallego, too, suffers from PTSD, he said — from his six months while deployed in Iraq as a Marine. The Arizona congressman, who is challenging independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema in 2024, said that he experiences guilt over surviving combat when some others did not.

“I sometimes feel a lot of regret. I feel sometimes that, you know, that I should have gone instead of some of my guys that went. And sometimes I feel maybe a little hypersensitive about my surroundings,” he said.

Torres said he first began experiencing symptoms of depression as a high school student. He later dropped out of New York University in 2007 as he again struggled with his mental health.

Admitted into New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Hospital, Torres was then formally diagnosed with major depressive disorder, he said.

“There were moments when I even attempted suicide,” Torres said. “Ever since then, I’ve been managing the condition, and I never thought I would make it to the United States Congress.”

Mental health’s history of political damage: Has it changed?

In July 1972, Democratic presidential nominee Sen. George McGovern’s running mate, Missouri Sen. Thomas Eagleton, told journalists he had previously undergone electric shock treatments and psychiatric care for exhaustion and depression.

Though McGovern pledged to support Eagleton, he was forced off the ticket just over two weeks later.

It was one of the first times in modern history that a major political figure experienced fallout from revealing their mental health battles. Smith told ABC News that when she shared her history of depression while on the Senate floor in 2019, Eagleton was “in her mind.”

In the 51 years since Eagleton’s experience, each of the four members acknowledged, strides have been made around mental health and politics — even as recent as earlier in their own careers as elected officials.

“I felt when I first ran for office that this was my big skeleton in the closet,” said Moulton.

He thought an announcement of his PTSD might “end his career.”

“Ironically, getting help for it, seeing a therapist, can make the political attacks even worse,” he said.

Torres, who is gay, said that during his first run for office, in 2013, when he was vying for a city council spot, he was more open with his sexuality than the fact that he dealt with mental health issues.

He said that an opponent in that race “attempted to weaponize my mental health against me. And so after that race, I said, ‘I’m going to tell my story on my own terms.'”

With time, though, and with more and more people speaking out, the stigma has lessened.

“When I started going to therapists I [would] try to find as many ways as possible to hide that I was going to a therapist. Like I would make sure that I was driving in a way that people couldn’t figure out that I was pulling up to the therapist’s office,” Gallego said.

“And it’s been … a sea change that I don’t have to do that anymore,” he said.

The members said they’ve mostly been met with support from their peers as well, just as Fetterman was.

“Instead of being castigated, I remember how many people in the next few days and weeks came up to me and just opened up about their own stories,” Moulton said, remembering what happened after he publicly shared his story of PTSD in 2019. “I mean, people from all over America I’d never met before, but even close colleagues, friends, people in my office.”

Other lawmakers may be privately struggling still, Torres said: “There are 535 members in Congress. I suspect we’re not the only four.”

“I think the fact that the four of us are here is a sign of progress. But the fact that only four of us are here is a sign that we have a distance to travel,” he said.

What’s been done — and still to do

President Joe Biden included a number of mental health provisions in his most recent budget proposal, which is unlikely to gain traction in the currently divided Congress.

Legislators did, however, increase funding for mental health resources as part of the 2023 omnibus spending package passed in January.

That law bolstered money for virtual peer support and expanded mental health services in schools, substance use health support and maternal mental health care, among other things.

Smith singled out last year’s anti-gun violence package that was brokered with Republicans, which had some notable mental health measures as well, “supporting community behavioral health centers all over the country, supporting access to school-based care for mental health.”

“That I’m really, really proud of. And we did that,” Smith said.

Last year’s law also included funds to transition to the new 988 crisis line, which was implemented in July and aims to provide suicide prevention and mental health support nationwide.

Moulton co-authored the bill to establish 988, which he called “probably the single most impactful thing [he’s] done in Congress.”

“I hear from people across the country who say, ‘That saved my life.’ And you know what? The risk was worth it, too, right?” he said. “Because telling my story, telling our stories, I mean, if that had cost any of our political careers and yet we saved just one life by doing that — it’s worth it.”

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(NEW YORK) — About one in five adults say they’ve been threatened with a gun at some point in their life, according to a new survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

The report, published Tuesday, looked at 1,271 Americans’ experiences with gun-related violence and incidents across the U.S. between March 14 and March 23 of this year.

About one in five say a family member has been killed by a gun (including death by suicide), and about one in six say they’ve witnessed someone being injured by a gun.

More than half of U.S. adults have been affected by guns in some way, reporting that they or a family member has been injured or killed by a gun, threatened with a gun or used a gun in self-defense.

“When you think about the complexity of this issue it cuts across all sorts of different sectors and disciplines…there’s no one person or one organization that’s going to solve this issue…by definition, this is a complex issue that’s happening in cities and states all across this country affecting millions of Americans” said Dr. Joseph Sakran, a trauma surgeon and associate professor at Johns Hopkins Hospital, who is a public health expert and nationally recognized advocate for gun violence prevention as a survivor of gun violence himself.

The survey highlighted racial disparities with Black adults being about twice as likely as white or Hispanic adults to say they’ve had a family member killed by a gun.

A third of Black and Hispanic adults say they worry “daily” or “almost daily” that someone in their family will become a victim of gun violence.

“Mass shootings are a small portion of the overall public health problem that we face…they are the tip of the iceberg, we have the responsibility to talk about the daily toll of gun violence… the disparities that exist in communities of color, and different demographics that are significantly impacting not just young people, but young brown and Black men, are in many of our cities and states,” Dr. Sakran said.

Many people buy guns for protection, as three in 10 adults (29%) have purchased a gun to protect themselves or their family from the possibility of gun violence. Yet, three in four adults surveyed said at least one of their guns is stored in a manner that doesn’t reflect common gun safety practices — like keeping guns in the same place as ammunition, storing a loaded gun, or keeping it unlocked.

“The best medical treatment is prevention… the work that we do beyond the bedside is just as important… engaging with different stakeholders, communities, policymakers, and so forth…where not just doctors, but nurses and techs and researchers kind of stood up and said, ‘No, we have the rights and both opportunity and the responsibility to be part of the solution. So, the next generation of healthcare leaders in America are starting to realize these non-traditional ways to be impactful,’” said Dr. Sakran.

The report showed that only 5% of adults say a doctor or healthcare provider has ever talked to them about gun safety.

Dr. Sakran added “the role of the healthcare professional, talking to their patients, about concepts and aspects of gun safety, like safe storage as an example… we traditionally have not done that.. we talked about other public health issues like obesity and smoking, and so forth.”

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