Samaritans work not unnoticed

I AGREE wholeheartedly with The Samaritans’ Public Relation Manager, Paul O’Hare’s comments on suicide.

In a newspaper article this week, one of our leading professors in the field of psychiatry states that discussing suicide desensitises us. If there is no healthy discussion and debate surrounding the many issues in our society, then the stigma and shame remains in situ.

We, the public, have every right to question the treatment and care of our mental health patients. Fergal Bowers in his book, Suicide in Ireland has clearly stated that our suicide statistics have been under-reported for a number of years.