A New Report Says Suicide Victims Are Being Failed By the Government

The number of people taking their own lives in England is unacceptably high – a fact recognised in a new report by the Health Select Committee. There was a downward trend in the suicide rate between 1981 and 2007, but since then there has been a worryingly steady increase. The number of deaths by suicide was 4,820 in England in 2015 – part of a UK-wide figure of 6,188.

Most disgraceful is the news that one in three people who commit suicide are in contact with a GP before death, but are not given enough help. MPs said long delays for specialists and a failure to identify mental health problems meant too many people at risk weren't getting help. The report said: "There are serious concerns about the ongoing long waits after referral from primary care to specialist services, and we urge the government to address in its suicide prevention strategy how this situation will be improved."

This report reflects what we already know – that suicide can be preventable with the right intervention and proper short and long-term care. Currently, people are not getting that. It's a complex issue, but on a practical level it's cause and effect.

The committee said support needed to be more accessible to those at risk. They called for the NHS to "embrace innovative approaches", such as online services; said that GPs also needed more training in spotting people at risk of suicide; and that there should be more support after patients are discharged from psychiatric services.

The new government suicide prevention strategy is due to be announced in January. The committee said the government needed to do better than last time, as the "2012 suicide prevention strategy has been characterised by inadequate leadership, poor accountability and insufficient action".

In 2015-16, 252 people took their own lives, or were suspected of having done so, on the railways. Network Rail has recruited academics to study the communities around high risk areas at railways to understand what can be done to prevent deaths there, which is a change in suicide research approach – something that usually relies on psychologists.

But this alone will not be enough to lower the suicide rate. The focus has to be spread across helping people with their mental health from before the onset of illness to when they're severely unwell. This loss of life is about a lack of funding from the top and the continuation of a mental health crisis that is utterly failing people.

@hannahrosewens

(Image by Helmut Januschka, via)

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