On Wednesday, a Los Angeles jury found Meta and YouTube negligent in the design and operation of their platforms. They determined that both companies knew their products posed dangers to minors, they failed to adequately warn users of the risks, and their conduct was a substantial factor in causing the plaintiff significant psychological harm, contributing to her mental health conditions, which included depression, body dysmorphia, and suicidal thoughts. This decision comes one day after a New Mexico jury concluded that Meta misled users about safety and failed to protect children from harm and exploitation. 

“These verdicts reinforce what young people and families have been saying for years: These platforms are designed to keep young people hooked, and these products are harming many young people’s mental health,” said John MacPhee, JED’s CEO. “We are grateful to all the families, including those who have lost someone, who have come forward to bring cases like this to light. We also recognize the role of state leaders who are standing up for young people’s safety and mental health. Their courage has forced long-overdue accountability.” 

These cases are part of a much broader reckoning, with thousands of similar lawsuits and young people, families, communities, and states demanding change. The harm is real, and the onus must be on the companies that design platforms to prevent it. There are clear solutions that we all can demand: enforceable standards, mandatory transparency, and protections for every young person online. 

At JED, we remain committed to strengthening the systems that support youth mental health and suicide prevention nationwide. The safety and well-being of our young people must come first. Protecting them is not partisan, not optional, and not something to be deferred until after the damage is done. It is the measure of whether innovation serves society or erodes it, and the moment to choose is now.

More From JED About AI and Youth Mental Health

• Tech Companies and Policymakers Must Safeguard Youth Mental Health in AI Technologies
• When AI Hurts the Youth It Claims to Help
• Why Your Teen Shouldn’t Be Using AI Companions – and What to Do If They Are
• Why AI Companions Are Risky – and What to Know If You Already Use Them

The Jed Foundation (JED) is partnering with Science to People (S2P) to pilot Akari Idea Studio, an artificial intelligence (AI) creative partner designed to help content creators produce accurate, trustworthy, and culturally attuned science and health communication. 

The collaboration reflects JED’s broader effort to help shape AI, media, and digital environments that better support youth mental health and suicide prevention. As generative AI tools increasingly shape how information is created and shared, the values and evidence behind those tools play an important role in how young people encounter mental health information and whether that information serves them well. 

Akari is powered by VeriSciLM, a language model designed specifically for health and science communication. The model draws on curated scientific sources and communication research, from partners including the National Academy of Medicine, FrameWorks Institute, Yale School of Public Health, and JED, alongside science translation and public health messaging recommended practices. Several of those partners are also collaborating to evaluate how Akari influences the accuracy, clarity, and trustworthiness of mental health content. 

JED’s Digital Storytelling Guide — tools and guidance for creators on how to tell mental health stories in ways that are safe, impactful, and supportive of both their audiences and their own well-being — is integrated into Akari’s creator workflows. ​​JED is also participating in Akari’s ongoing review and evaluation, contributing expertise as the tool develops. 

Akari’s eight-week pilot for health and wellness content creators launched on March 16. It aims to demonstrate what responsible, research-informed AI can look like in practice and to generate insights into what increases trust, accuracy, and emotional resonance in creator-driven mental health content. That will contribute to a still-nascent body of knowledge about how AI tools can support rather than undermine the safe, accurate mental health information that young people deserve.

JED is committed to ensuring that AI supports youth mental health, and this partnership with S2P is one part of that work. 

Read more about JED’s thinking on AI, media, and youth well-being.

Newly released data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) offers a measure of hope: Although suicide rates were largely stable the past several years, rates among young people ages 10 to 24 declined in 2024 compared to the peak rates observed in 2021, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

At JED, we closely analyzed national suicide mortality data from 2021 to 2024 by sex and across age groups, race, and ethnicity. We found significant declines among young people ages 10 to 14, 15 to 19, and 20 to 24 — and overall across ages 10 to 24. The declines were driven largely by reductions in suicide rates among boys and young men, where decreases were observed across every age group. Rates among girls remained statistically unchanged.

We also saw significant overall declines among non-Hispanic American Indian and Alaska Native, white, and Asian youth ages 10 to 24, as well as among Black teens ages 15 to 19.

Although we welcome the declines, suicide rates among young people remain much too high. 

We are still facing a youth mental health crisis, and troubling disparities persist. Suicide rates among non-Hispanic American Indian and Alaska Native youth are consistently very high despite declines. Also, for the first time, suicide rates among Black young adults ages 20 to 24 surpassed those of their white peers — a concerning shift given historically lower rates among this group. The gap between Black and white teens ages 15 to 19 has also narrowed as Black youth rates have increased over time.

Firearms remain the leading cause of suicide death among young people, accounting for more than half of youth suicides. Firearm suicide rates among 10- to 24-year-olds peaked in 2021 and declined slightly by 2024, but not equitably. Rates declined among non-Hispanic white youth, but not among their Black peers. Firearm suicide rates among Black 10- to 24-year-olds surpassed those of white youth for the first time in 2022 and remained high in 2023 and 2024.

These are not just statistics. They reflect young lives, families, and communities. And they remind us why JED’s mission to protect emotional health and prevent suicide among teens and young adults has never been more critical.

Using Momentum for Meaningful Change

Declines in suicide rates show that prevention is possible, but our work is not over. Millions of young people continue to struggle with hopelessness, despair, isolation, and suicidal thoughts. Suicide mortality data represents only the most tragic outcome of a much larger crisis of emotional distress.

At JED, we know that prevention works, and that it requires a comprehensive, sustained approach. We partner with K-12 school districts, high schools, colleges, and community-based organizations to strengthen mental health systems, equip young people with life skills that build resilience, and mobilize communities.

JED also promotes safe and responsible firearm storage and other evidence-based interventions designed to reduce access to the most lethal means of suicide. Because suicide attempts are often impulsive, increasing time and distance between a person in crisis and a lethal method can save lives. Interventions include safe handling and secure storage of firearms, counseling on access to lethal means by clinicians and social service providers, and legislation that ensures that parents and families with children at risk for suicide are offered education on firearm safety.

Your Partnership Saves Lives

This new data shows us that progress is possible, but sustained progress requires sustained commitment. Our work and mission are more urgent than ever as disparities widen for some groups, firearm suicide rates remain among the highest in our nation’s history, and so many young people still feel disconnected and alone.

Your support makes it possible for JED to expand our reach, deepen our partnerships, and strengthen the comprehensive systems that protect young lives. Together we can build on this moment not only to continue to reduce suicide rates from historic highs, but also to create a future in which every young person has the support, connection, and hope they deserve. We are grateful to stand with you in this lifesaving work.

Find local and national news coverage of anticipated youth mental health trends in technology, policy, and economy.

• Sinclair Broadcast Group: Youth mental health trends marked by rapid technological change, shifting social habits
• Mental Health Weekly: JED highlights growing youth MH risks in an AI-driven era
• The Mind Journal: Youth Mental Health Trends in 2026 Highlight Risks–and Reasons for Hope

Find local and national news coverage of Youth Mental Health in the AI Era: How GenAI Enters Help-Seeking Pathways

• Sinclair Broadcast Group: Youth and AI: Use context matters, but report finds ‘red flag’ for mental health support
• Inside Higher Ed: AI Usage Mirrors Young People’s Offline Struggles
• Education Week: How Teens and Young People Use AI Tools for Learning and Mental Health Support

 

In 2021, when Julian died at age 32, his family chose to speak openly about the fact that Julian died by suicide.

His father, Dr. Tony Rostain, said that speaking openly would have been far less common just a few years earlier. Something in the culture had shifted. Families were speaking more plainly, and the silence that once surrounded suicide had begun, slowly, to loosen.

That shift didn’t make grief easier, but it changed the way he grieved. 

Tony has spent his career as a psychiatrist, working with children, adolescents, and families in crisis. He has treated patients who struggled with thoughts of suicide and suicide attempts. He had even lost patients to suicide. None of that prepared him for losing his own child.

“When Julian died,” he says, “it was a profound shock to everyone who knew him.” Even though Julian had struggled with depression, it was hard to reconcile his death with the way others experienced him. Friends kept saying the same thing: “Not Julian. He was the one we turned to.”

In the days after his death, Tony and his family gathered in a backyard with about 30 relatives. There was one rule: They wouldn’t talk about why Julian died. They would talk about who he was and how he lived.

For more than an hour, people shared stories. And Tony remembers feeling, for the first time since the loss, something other than devastation.

Soon after, Tony held shiva — four nights of open gathering. More than 400 people came. Julian’s friends came from different chapters of his life. The volume of love didn’t erase the pain, but it changed how Tony carried it.

“The sense of being in a community rather than suffering this alone made a world of difference,” he says.

Shame and self-blame still surfaced. Tony describes the familiar spiral many parents experience after a suicide loss: What did I miss? What should I have done differently?  Those thoughts didn’t disappear overnight. But over time, compassion from others softened their grip.

About a year after Julian’s death, Tony said he realized that self-blame had become an obstacle to grieving. As long as he stayed locked in what he should have done differently, he couldn’t fully accept Julian as a whole person, as someone who lived a complete life.

He wrote a mantra:

Mourn his death
Honor his memory
Cherish his heart
Live with his spirit
Love him always

In the months that followed, love showed up in unexpected ways. Tony began dreaming about Julian. At first the dreams were terrifying. Then one night, they changed.

Tony was sitting by the sea. Julian emerged from the water, young again, 7 or 8 years old. Tony wrapped him in a towel and held him. The hug felt real and when Tony woke up, he cried.

“That was a turning point,” he says. “It helped me understand that Julian was still alive in me.”

The dreams continued to evolve. Sometimes Julian appeared older. Sometimes they talked. Sometimes Tony knew, even in the dream, that Julian would leave again. Painful as they were, the dreams became another way of staying connected.

Near Tony’s home, in a park by the Schuylkill River, there’s a meadow where he and Julian used to walk their dogs. Tony dedicated a bench there in Julian’s memory — a place for friends to sit, to gather, to remember.

The point has never been to memorialize how Julian died, Tony says, but to honor how he lived.

That distinction matters to him, especially when conversations turn to suicide prevention. Tony still believes deeply in prevention; he built his career around it. But he’s careful with language that suggests every suicide is preventable, because he knows where that idea can deepen shame and self-blame for families. What remains, for him, is how we respond afterward. Whether families are left alone with shame, or surrounded by people who allow grief to exist without explanation.

“The meaning of someone’s life,” Tony says, “has nothing to do with how they died.”

Visit Julian’s memorial page.

If you or someone you know is experiencing a mental health crisis, call the national suicide and crisis number — 988 — or text HOME to 741-741 for a free, confidential conversation with a trained counselor at any time. If the mental health crisis results in a medical emergency or if there is immediate danger of harm, call 911 and explain that you need support for a mental health crisis.