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You might be interested in Cause Area: Mental Health, a post which won second place in the December forum prize.
Curated and popular this week
This post is co-authored with Ben Garfinkel. It is cross-posted from the CEA blog. A PDF version can be found here.
Summary: Some strategic decisions available to the effective altruism m...
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TL;DR: I'm releasing a website that ranks philanthropists according to EA principles and research, and allows users to re-rank the list using their own assumptions. I'd like feedback and help making it better. I'd especially like ideas for how to make the results more trustworthy. Funding may be available.
Crossposted to LessWrong.
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Disclaimer: Although I work on the Groups Team at CEA, I’m writing this in a personal capacity, and this post does not constitute an endorsement by CEA.
Agency - the realisation that you really can just do things.
TL;DR
Biosecurity needs people (of any background) who are agentic and have a high execution velocity and track record....
Recent opportunities to take action
I have a severe OCD diagnosis, confirmed with 8 physicians, all in all with the OCD like 4-5 more comorbid issues, that overlap with the anxious element, but also visual hallucinations, especially when I get in my loops.
What would the the most cost-effective way to help me?
Early detection and support from peers.
That's all, I am unsure if there are organizations that work in that field, but if you could put together an early support group for teens, that could have a huge impact. My first peer support was found through Facebook groups.
Sahara, a depressed teen living in Mexico (I was 15 she was 17 at the time)
and
Hendrik, a really depressed teen living in Germany (I was 15 he was 18)
They provided me a shoulder to talk about my fears, my compulsions and the rest is history. Sahara is no longer as depressed and Hendrik is doing good in life. We did this in a give and take support, give when you can, and take when you need.
I am probably the one that is still the worst off, but my diagnosis is a complex one as OCD is genetically present in my family and I had the bad fortune of a very traumatic childhood to develop the worst repeat loops.
SO NOT TO GET TOO LONG, I believe the best way to spend your time and maybe funds is a local support group for teens and young adults, as that time is the most unstable period of our lives, maybe be an anchor point for some teens that can't or won't reach out to service providers.
Also, a fun note, the DALY rate for OCD is 0.30-0.45 per year of lived life, so across my lifetime I estimate I would have a loss of 40-50 DALY, which is not a negligible number. I will use this as an inspiration to write a post on mental health issues and DALY estimates, if you want maybe we could co-author one? Examine the most common mental illnesses and using the DALY estimates to calculate how much life is lost, especially due to people being left untreated.