The American Legion recently launched an initiative to reduce the rate of veteran suicide by destigmatizing mental health issues. Be the One’s goal is to make mental health support more accessible to veterans, because of the high rates of suicide within the community. For the past two decades, the suicide rate for veterans was 57.3% greater than for non-veteran U.S. adults, according to a 2022 U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs report.
Part of the effort to destigmatize asking for mental health help starts within individual communities. Be the One encourages local chapters of American Legion to provide peer-to-peer support at events, even when they do not focus on raising awareness on the effects of post-traumatic stress disorder and suicide.
According to Randy Gunn, who has been a member of the American Legion for 32 years, Chesterfield County’s Veterans Day Motorcycle Biker Rally in November served as the perfect opportunity to promote the initiative.
“We are attempting to bring awareness to let anybody who is on the bubble or having trouble know that we can bring it to the forefront and give them the right information,” Gunn said, “so they can call somebody and get some help.”
This was the fifth year that Chesterfield has organized the Veterans Day event, which honored Vietnam War veterans who had difficulty acclimating to their communities when they returned home.
