The topic of suicide is a vexing one and sometimes there just aren’t any warning signs.
Just last week, celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain and designer Kate Spade took their own lives, within days of each other, sending shock throughout the entertainment world.
And it appears that there is no easy fix, according to Dr. Stan Kutcher, a leading expert in Mental Health and a Professor in the Department of Mental Health and Psychiatry at Dalhousie University in Halifax.
“There is no simple solution to the question of what can we look for in signs, and the hope that for everybody we can find the sign, is itself a hope,” says Dr. Kutcher.
Kutcher says suicide is a behaviour, and says people with mental illnesses are much more prone or vulnerable to suicide.
“Suicide is much more common in people who have depression, it’s much more common in people who have bi-polar illness, it’s much more common in people who have schizophrenia and it’s much more common in people who struggle with drug and alcohol abuse,” notes Kutcher.
That being said, Kutcher notes not all people who die by suicide have one of those conditions.
Here in Nova Scotia, the Chair of the Halifax Task Force for Suicide Prevention, says a new program has been in the works for roughly 4 years.
Doctor Joseph Sadek, of the Nova Scotia Hospital in Dartmouth, says they’ve now expanded their efforts province wide.
“By 2017 we have a policy that involves all the province for suicide prevention and I believe that other provinces are looking now to take what we have done and use them as well,” says Dr. Sadek.”
Story by Craig Power
@CraigTPower
