‘More pro-active response’ needed to tackle suicide epidemic
The junior minister with responsibility for mental health was commenting on a report by the National Suicide Research Foundation that highlighted factors in suicides, such as relationship break-ups, bereavement, and finances.
Ms Lynch said there was a need to reach out and identify people at risk of suicide at an early stage.
“Early intervention is successful. We have the research; we know what needs to be done; we have the funding for what needs to be done but I have said this time and time again, this is not something the Government can do on its own — it is very much something that the community and service providers need to identify,” she said.
The report’s review of 190 consecutive suicides in Cork City and county revealed that more than eight out of 10 people who died by suicide had been in contact with their GP a year before they died.
It also revealed that 78% had abused alcohol in the year before they died.
“There was nothing we did not know already,” Ms Lynch said at the launch of the report — the first of its kind from the foundation at the Department of Health in Dublin.
Ms Lynch said the research confirmed issues that agencies dealing with suicide were confronting.
“We know that alcohol plays a major part in self-harm and, sometimes but not always, in completed suicides. We know as well that when people continue to self-harm that they will eventually complete the suicide.”
Ms Lynch said the Irish College of General Practitioners (ICGP) was introducing a training scheme for GPs to help identify those at risk earlier. Ms Lynch also said there were now specially trained nurses to ease the suicide risk.
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