Time to shine the light on Youth Suicide

Time to shine the light on Youth Suicide says Gregory Fortuin

Founding Chair of the ‘Youth Suicide Awareness Trust’ Gregory Fortuin strongly supports Chief Coroner, Judge Neil Maclean’s call for more informed media reporting on suicide.

“The death of a young person through suicide is not a statistic, but a personal tragedy for all concerned,” says Gregory Fortuin. “The current rules surrounding the media’s reporting of suicides do not work.”

In 1997 when the Youth Suicide Awareness Trust was launched by parents who had lost young people through suicide, there were calls of condemnation from so called experts that it would lead to more copycat suicides. However, the statistics for the seven years the trust operated show that there was no increase in the number of suicides, rather, they tell a remarkably different story.

Prior to the operation of the trust, the strategy of total silence saw New Zealand leading the world in youth suicide. A shameful statistic that saw three young people a week taking their own lives in 1996. Now once again, our suicide rates are beyond alarming.

“Awareness and understanding are vital,” says Mr Fortuin. “How can you inform parents of the tell tale signs if there is a total veil of secrecy in the media? I fully support the need for intelligent reporting that does not raise the spectre of copycat suicides. But the current rigid regime does not work, and growing calls both locally and internationally should be listened to. The media can have an important and positive role to play in this issue.”

“When I was actively involved with the trust, we set out to listen to the parents who were affected by suicide. Overwhelmingly they wanted us to raise awareness. They wanted to know what the danger signs were, when their kids were most vulnerable and how to support them. With leadership from the Hon Deborah Morris who was at that time Youth Affairs Minister, the Youth Suicide Prevention Strategy was launched, but what preventive action is now taking place? We need a new call to action.

The Chief Coroner, Judge Neil MacLean is also calling for change. "My personal view is that there's room for some gentle opening up of things .. but it probably requires legislative change to restore the balance, and that's a matter for a conscience vote in Parliament," says Judge MacLean.

“Young people do not get informed via the media,” says Mr Fortuin. “They use text, the internet and face to face communication, so some of the reasoning behind the ban on reporting is no longer valid. We’re sitting on an awful truth. If you can find the statistics for youth suicide, you’ll be horrified to see they have crept back up to 2 ½ kids per week, but it gets buried in annual reports, so there’s no awareness and a lack of action.”

“There are no silver bullets and no one has a monopoly on solutions, but the sooner we openly acknowledge that we are losing more people to suicide than car accidents, the sooner we will confront this carnage.

Notes:
• The number of deaths ruled as self-inflicted is around 540 for each of the past three financial years while the road toll has dropped from 435 in 2004 and to 390 last year.
• More than 2500 New Zealanders are admitted to hospital annually after intentional self-harm.

ENDS

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