Talk Helps Prevent Deaths: Clinic Boss
Posted on: Monday, 22 August 2005, 18:00 CDT
HELP AGENCIES Gore Community Mental Health team -- 208 0299 Gore and Districts Community Counselling Centre -- 208 5366 Lifeline -- 0800 543354 Southland Mental Health Emergency Team -- 0800 467846 Family GPs Community youth worker School guidance counsellors TALKING about suicide was probably the best way to prevent more young people killing themselves, Gore Counselling Centre clinical team leader Bruce Wilson said yesterday.Parts of the Gore community are reeling from a string of suicides and there are fears the numbers will grow because of a copycat phenomenon called "the contagion effect" .
An earlier report suggesting eight suicides in the past seven weeks in Eastern Southland appears to be inaccurate.
But officials yesterday confirmed they knew of at least four young people who had taken their lives during the past few months.
Dr Wilson said there was a school of thought that keeping suicides secret would prevent further deaths.
However, there was no evidence that keeping suicides hidden was of any preventive value.
It was better to bring it out in the open.
"Because people in this state of mind (suicide) want to isolate themselves and go into a cocoon," he said.
It was only by confronting and challenging them that they could get the help and support they needed.
The centre next week planned to start a programme, called There's More to Life, to give young people a chance to talk through what was happening.
With four deaths, it was likely twice as many were at risk because of the contagion effect.
"Sometimes these things happen in blocks. We don't want this one to keep going," Dr Wilson said.
The Southland District Health Board this week confirmed it would be working with other agencies to help the community deal with the problem.
General manager of mental health services Chris Nolan said yesterday the board was still gathering facts.
The exact number of deaths, their causes and whether they were linked was still unknown.
Clinical director Heather McPherson said if the deaths were not linked, they could not be classified as a cluster.
The last known suicide cluster in Southland was in the late 1990s.
Source: Southland Times, The
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