We must do everything possible to avert the one tragedy that affects us like no other

THE idea of a candlelit vigil for Suicide Prevention Day recently was appropriate, and fair play to the Irish rugby stars for supporting the event.

Suicide touches lives in ways that no other human tragedy does. It is the hidden death that dare not speak its name, immersing whole communities in a grief that is inconsolable.

At this moment, someone somewhere in Ireland is likely contemplating this drastic way out of a crisis or as an imagined solution to a seemingly insoluble problem or challenge. Far from being a solution, it will be the cause of unbearable pain and heartache of a kind that no family or human being deserves to endure.