Honoring Veterans Day by Facing the Fight Against Veteran Suicide

Veterans Day marks an important time to honor our nation’s veterans, their service and the sacrifices they’ve made. Sadly, far too many veterans struggle well beyond the years of their service. 

The veteran suicide rate is 57% higher than the national average and more than 120,000 veterans have died by suicide since 2001, making it the second leading cause of death among post 9/11 vets.

As sobering as these statistics are, they’re also preventable.

Last year, the Humana Foundation joined USAA, the USAA Foundation and the Endeavors Foundation to launch Face the Fight™, an initiative to raise awareness and support for veteran suicide prevention with the goal of cutting the veteran suicide rate in half by 2030.

We all knew that with such a lofty goal, we couldn’t do it on our own.

A key component of Face the Fight's work is providing philanthropic grants to nonprofit organizations to support evidence-based programs that align with public health best practices for suicide prevention and data from the VA. We now have more than 175 dedicated organizations and thousands of individuals supporting the coalition and $85 million pledged through 2027 to continue to fund this critical work.

While we’re only one year in, the collective efforts are working. The first annual progress report demonstrated measurable impact, including:

• Screening nearly 15,000 veterans for suicide risk
• Providing more than 5,000 veterans with suicide-specific interventions
• Training 130 mental health clinicians to deliver suicide-specific treatments
• Training over 140 mental health clinicians and peers to talk with veterans about voluntary, safe and secure storage of firearms at times of distress
• Providing 10 new expert, national trainers in suicide-specific treatment

While there is still more work to be done, we remain hopeful this Veterans Day that we are working toward a future where no veteran feels without hope.