history of this country, can make everyday feel like, some days, like a 10 mile slog through knee-deep mud, it s no secret, anxiety, stress, addiction, depression, all of it on the rise university poll released this month showed nine in 10 registered voters believe there is a mental health crisis happening right now in this country. one of the primary drivers of this psychological epidemic is our politics. don t need a study to tell us that but we have one anyway, chair of the political science department at university nebraska lincoln sought to font quantify the effect of politics on americans through the trump years and beyond, after compiling the data here s the estimate, 94 million americans perceived politics as a primary source of stress, 44 million lost sleep because of it, 30 million noted politics harmed