Family important in tackling suicide – Dr Paloma Mohamed

Family history has a great role to play in personal suicide tendencies – this is according to Dr Paloma Mohamed, who made the pronouncement on Friday as she addressed members of the Police Force at a suicide awareness forum.

The event, organised by the West Berbice Chapter of the Guyana Association of Female Police, was held at the St Michael’s Church Hall at Hopetown, West Coast Berbice, Region Five (Mahaica-Berbice).

Dr Mohamed, who is Deputy Chancellor of the University of Guyana and teaches “Matters in Public Health”, pointed to an important aspect of bringing awareness about the suicide epidemic – placing focus on those who have attempted suicide.

She explained, “When people die of suicide and we report those numbers, that doesn’t help anybody. It helps in raising awareness in people that there is trouble and people have died, but really, I think that the more important numbers to understand are those who repeatedly tried to commit suicide until quite a number of them actually succeed.”

She noted that what was more frightening than the number of those who actually complete the act was the reality that seven times that figure attempt suicide. “It is almost seven times more than those who end up completing the act,” she said.

Dr Mohamed highlighted some of the reasons for persons to want to harm themselves.

A 2012 World Health Organisation report indicated that Guyana had a suicide rate of 44.2 per 100,000 people and that for every single suicide committed by a female, there were 3.2 suicides committed by males. By comparison, neighbouring Suriname had a suicide rate of 27.8 per 100,000 persons, and Venezuela’s rate was 2.6 per 100,000 persons.

Alluding to the reasons why suicide in Guyana had been so difficult to eradicate, Dr Mohamed said, “It is not about just counselling somebody when they show up in your office. Suicidal tendencies and suicidal ideas are part of a wide, broad and deep social context and if we continue to put the blame on individuals when they show up in the office and to think that counselling alone will help… We need to absorb those people who make general life better.” These persons, she explained, are more often than not family members. She added that we were all part of a complex series of interrelationships, which can either support or pressure us.

The programme was organised by Chairperson of the West Berbice Chapter, Sergeant Cynthia Kelly.