This International Men’s Day, Brighton, Hove and District Samaritans are calling on everyone in the community to take their part in suicide prevention, particularly within the most at risk group, those who are socially disadvantaged.
This International Men’s Day, on November 19,Brighton, Hove and District Samaritans are calling on everyone in their communities to take their part in suicide prevention, particularly within the most at risk group, those who are socially disadvantaged.
Men are three times more likely to take their own lives than women and poorer men living in the poorest areas are ten times more likely to kill themselves than affluent men.
Reaching men in this group and tackling this inequality could have a huge impact on the number of people taking their own lives. Samaritans want this inequality to be tackled through local suicide prevention planning.
Brighton, Hove and District Samaritans director, Daniel Cheesman, said: “If you’re poor and male you are the most vulnerable to suicide. We need to see community based, multi-agency, targeted interventions offering support and messages that work for those at the greatest risk, to reduce the numbers of people taking their own lives. This is urgent. We are losing too many of our men to suicide and every single death is a tragedy that can wreak devastation in families and communities.”
The momentum for tackling suicide has built during 2016 and seventy members of the National Suicide Prevention Alliance came together on World Suicide Prevention Day to tell men, ‘It’s Okay To Talk’.
Samaritans met with the Duke of Cambridge together with other key organisations to look at how to reduce suicide and was instrumental in the development of new guidance just released from Public Health England and NSPA to help Local Authorities with their suicide prevention planning.
Samaritans CEO, Ruth Sutherland, said: “Suicide has never been more part of the national conversation, but this isn’t enough. The sad truth is that we’re still not seeing deaths by suicide decreasing. We need to build on current momentum and make suicide prevention everybody’s business, in every community and stop people dying.”
This year International Men’s Day is highlighting the issue of male suicide.
Samaritans is calling on every local area to have a plan in place to reduce suicide amongst men, and all the other groups of people vulnerable to suicide.
Ruth continued: “The Government has said every council in the country needs to have a plan for preventing suicide, but shockingly many haven’t got started on one and those that have are often struggling to hold meetings and take action because of overstretched resources. In every local area, all the organisations who can play a part need to pull together. That includes health services, the police, community groups, and many others and tackle head on this biggest killer of men, under 50.”
Samaritans’ latest campaign, Local Action Saves Lives is asking individuals to email their local politicians to find our whether they are taking suicide prevention seriously.
Samaritans are available round the clock, every single day of the year. They provide a safe place for anyone struggling to cope, whoever they are, however they feel, whatever life has done to them.
Call 08457 90 90 90 or Brighton Hove and District Samaritans on 01273 738115.
For more information and to see what’s going in your area, click here:
For more information about male isolation and loneliness, click here:
