World Suicide Prevention Day 2023: Suicide is a serious public health problem with wide social, emotional and financial consequences. According to the data, around 700,000 suicides are reported on average worldwide each year, which deeply affects the lives of many. And in order to curb the unfortunate crisis, September 10th is celebrated every year as World Suicide Prevention Day. The day aims to promote understanding, sharing experiences and reaching out to the masses to take action and prevent suicide.
The International Association for Suicide Prevention and the World Health Organization (WHO) jointly launched World Suicide Prevention Day (WSPD) in 2003. Every year on September 10, organizations, governments and the general public are encouraged to raise awareness of the problem and focus attention on it with a clear message that suicides can be avoided.
World Suicide Prevention Day 2023: date, theme, history and significance
World Suicide Prevention Day 2023: Theme
World Suicide Prevention Day is being celebrated this year with the theme of the triennial that started in 2021. The theme is ‘Creating hope through action’. It advocates making efforts to promote compassion and understanding through helping and listening. We can say that there is hope and that we care and want to support those who are thinking about suicide by acting in a way that instills hope. It also implies that our efforts, no matter how big or small, can give hope to those who are struggling.
World Suicide Prevention Day 2023: Significance
Each year, World Suicide Prevention Day aims to draw attention to the problem, reduce stigma and raise awareness among organizations, governments and the public, giving a unified message that suicide can be prevented. It represents a global commitment to focus attention on suicide prevention. All of us – family members, friends, co-workers, community members, educators, religious leaders, health professionals, political officials and governments can take action to prevent suicides in the region.
World Suicide Prevention Day 2023: Goals
According to the Pan American Health Organization, “The overall goal of this day is to raise awareness of suicide prevention throughout the world. The aims include promoting stakeholder collaboration and self-empowerment to address issues of self-harm and suicide through preventative action.”
This can be achieved by improving the skills of health professionals and other key participants, spreading encouraging and educational messages to the general public and vulnerable populations such as young people, and encouraging open dialogue about mental health at all levels of society at home, at school, at work, etc. People who think about suicide or have been touched by it are also invited to share their experiences and get support from experts.
World Suicide Prevention Day 2023: key facts
- Unlike all other regions of the World Health Organization, the Region of the Americas is experiencing an increase in suicide mortality.
- It emphasizes the urgent need to make suicide prevention a top priority in public health.
- Suicide and attempted suicide have consequences that affect not only the victims but also their families, communities and societies as a whole.
- The gender gap in suicide mortality is a cultural phenomenon, meaning that social norms regarding gender and suicide greatly influence its existence and extent.
- The global climate problem has exacerbated other humanitarian crises, including migration, and poses a serious threat to mental health.
Important days and dates in September 2023
World Suicide Prevention Day 2023: Awareness programs and activities
World Suicide Prevention Day is an opportunity for all sectors of society, the public, charities, communities, researchers, clinicians, practitioners, politicians and policy makers, volunteers, those bereaved by suicide, those with lived experience and other interested groups and individuals. Various programs and activities proposed by the International Association for Suicide Prevention are:
- Launching new initiatives, policies and strategies on World Suicide Prevention Day.
- Holding conferences, open days, educational seminars or public lectures and panels.
- Writing articles for national, regional and local newspapers, blogs and magazines.
- Holding press conferences. Placing information on your website and using the IASP World Suicide Prevention Day banner, promoting suicide prevention in your mother tongue.
- Ensuring interviews and speaking positions on radio and television. Organizing commemorations, events, candlelight ceremonies or walks in memory of those who have died by suicide. Ask national politicians who are responsible for health, public health, mental health or suicide prevention to make relevant announcements, publish policies or issue supporting statements or press releases about WSPD.
- Holding depression awareness events in public places and offering screenings for depression.
- Organizing cultural or spiritual events, fairs or exhibitions. Organizing walks to political or public places to highlight suicide prevention.
- Holding book launches or presenting new brochures, guides or pamphlets. Distribution of leaflets, posters and other written information.
- Organizing concerts, barbecues, breakfasts, lunches, competitions and fairs in public places. Writing editorials for scientific, medical, educational, nursing, legal and other relevant journals.
- Dissemination of research results.
- Creating a press release for a new research paper.
- Conducting courses on suicide awareness and depression. Lighting a candle by the window at 8 pm in support of: World Suicide Prevention Day, suicide prevention and awareness, suicide survivors and in memory of lost loved ones.
In conclusion, World Suicide Prevention Day raises hope by showing that there is faith and that we care and want to support those who are thinking about suicide. It also implies that our efforts, no matter how big or small, could give hope to those who are struggling.
Categories: Trends
Source: HIS Education