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If you search for drug rehab, addiction help and similar queries in Google search, Google in the US will now show you a big box for the SAMHSA National Helpline. This box obviously aims to give help to searchers in need, now. But for those in the business of addition and rehab, this will push down their ads and organic results.
Here are some screen shots of this in action:
Google also announced this morning that when people in the U.S. search on Google for information about anxiety, Google will provide access to a clinically-validated questionnaire called the GAD-7 (Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7). The GAD-7 will show up in the knowledge panel—the box of information that displays key facts when you search for something—and also has medically-validated information about anxiety, including symptoms and common treatments.
Google has done these hotline boxes for suicide related queries for about ten years now. But Google has left the addiction and rehab space alone until now.
Michelle Kubot Segovia posted on Twitter "The manually stuffed government listing has been replaced by a giant call-to-action above maps. Appreciate the idea, but this is not good for anyone."
With COVID, addiction and suicide is up and Google is doing what it can to help people.
