More kids are experiencing trauma now than the current generation of adults did when they were kids — does that set Hancock County up for health problems down the line?
Research has found that those who have had more “adverse childhood experiences,” as they’re known, are at risk of both physical and mental health issues even years later, into adulthood.
The Community Health Assessment released last year found that 17 percent of Hancock County adults reported three or more adverse childhood experiences. However, 23 percent of current youth reported this.
Adults who had experienced more adverse childhood experiences were more likely to be smokers, more likely to report having been depressed, and twice as likely to have used recreational drugs in the past six months (90 percent of adults who used recreational drugs experienced one or more adverse childhood experiences, compared with 45 percent of those who did not).
[For more of this story, written by Sara Arthurs, go to http://thecourier.com/life-new...pen-to-young-people/]
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