$232.2 billion
Estimated annual cost of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in the United States among all U.S. civilians, active-duty military personnel, and veterans. The data were collected in 2018, the most recent year the data were available at the time of the study, and were gleaned from insurance claims data, academic literature, and government publications.
82%
Share of the nation’s PTSD costs that civilians are responsible for, compared with 18% of costs from military personnel and veterans, who collectively make up about 8% of the U.S. population. (PTSD occurs more frequently among active-duty military than among civilians, but less frequently among veterans than among civilians.)
$25,684
Annual cost of PTSD per person for military personnel and veterans, versus $18,640 per person for civilians. For military personnel and veterans, most of these costs are related to direct health care and disability payments, while for civilians, most costs are related to direct health care and unemployment.
66.4%
Share of women, compared with 33.6% of men, who make up the entire population with PTSD. According to research, potentially related factors include that women exposed to trauma have higher levels of PTSD symptoms than men exposed to trauma, and that women experience the traumas of sexual assault and domestic violence more often than men.
