The Federal Communications Commission passed a rule requiring all wireless calls to the 988 Lifeline to be georouted. Geographic routing ensures that attempts to access the National Suicide Prevention Hotline for intervention services are routed to the location where the call was made, rather than the caller’s area code or exchange location. .
Once this rule goes into effect, national providers will have 30 days to implement geo-routing for these calls. Small non-state providers have 24 months to comply. The agency also announced a proposal to apply the same geo-routing policy to texts sent to 988.
The FCC has taken several steps in recent years to expand the coverage of the 988 Lifeline. After voting in 2020 to make the shortcut to contact the National Suicide Prevention Hotline a three-digit number, officials expanded the service in 2021 to add text support. T-Mobile was one of the first carriers to enable 988 to help customers access mental services. medical services.
If you are in trouble and need someone to help, please call 988. The full number is 1-800-273-8255 (1-800-273-TALK). Alternatively, you can contact Lifeline via web chat.
