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“We want to make sure that we are responding to everybody in crisis,” he said.

But less than half of the public health officials responsible for the 988 rollout felt confident that their communities were prepared, according to a recent RAND Corporation survey.

The overhaul of the Lifeline is not just limited to calls, texts and chats. While data shows that hotlines can resolve about 80 percent of crises without further intervention, the vision for 988 is that counselors will eventually be able to connect callers with mobile crisis teams that can come to where they are, as well as short-term mental health triage centers.

Those changes are expected to reduce law enforcement interventions and reliance on emergency rooms, ultimately keeping more people alive, advocates say.

The new Lifeline comes at a time of rising mental illness, including what the U.S. surgeon general has called a “devastating” crisis among young people. Suicide was the 12th leading cause of death for Americans of all ages in 2020, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the second leading cause among those ages 10 to 14 and 25 to 34. A person died by suicide every 11 minutes in 2020. Many believe that the pandemic has exacerbated mental health issues, and the revamped hotline is intended to expand beyond the scope of suicide to help anyone in crisis.

Despite the projected increase in volume, questions remain about long-term sustainable funding for 988. That is partly because the law establishing it, signed by President Donald J. Trump in October 2020 with bipartisan support, left the funding of call centers largely to states.