23 October 2019
Suicide prevention matters in humanitarian contexts too
The theme of this year’s World Mental Health Day, WMHD, Mental health promotion and suicide prevention, has allowed advocates globally to create a unique momentum on suicide prevention campaigning, bringing a vast body of information, materials and sharing of experiences between the celebration of World Suicide Prevention day, on the 10th of September, and World Mental Health Day.
The MHPSS Collaborative could only take this great opportunity to highlight the most the specific mayor impact that suicide has on children and youth in humanitarian settings.
Our campaign, #5weeks5messages, was committed to present the most relevant information regarding suicide prevention and how it is impacting the younger population of humanitarian settings, focusing that information in 5 different contents for each of the weeks.
During the first week, we shared some relevant information and figures that would allow our audience accessing the big picture of how suicide is a mayor crisis globally, with the very alarming evidence that every 40 seconds someone dies due to suicide, at the core of it.
We wanted as well, in this first week, highlight that suicide if affecting children and youth dramatically, a difficult to accept reality that needs to be brought to the attention of all communities.
For the second week of the campaign, we saw a need to bring the reality of suicide in humanitarian settings to the attention of the audience. Difficult to identify due to several believes and to tackle due to lack of preparedness and planned procedures, this is a reality that the humanitarian sector must give its best to address.
And to reinforce this message, we shared during week three, some voices and examples from the affected communities.
With the information shared to this point, quite a dramatic picture had been painted, but we wanted to highlight during our comprehensive message of week four, that much can be done by organizations to prevent suicide and promote mental health, providing ideas and demystifying suicide.
When it was time to actually celebrate World Mental Health Day, in week five of our campaign, The MHPSS Collaborative wanted to honored our mandate of convening actors at all levels, by making this week’s message about unity, cooperation, and amplifying the voices of many in support of suicide prevention.
We want to thank everybody for contributing and raising your voice.
