Suicide is the second leading cause of death among teenagers (the first: car accidents among boys, cancer among girls).
In the past year, there has been a steep increase of 43% in the number of patients with educational psychologists among students who are at high risk of suicide, according to data from the Forum of Organizations for Public Psychology.
The Knesset will hold a conference this morning in preparation for the International Suicide Prevention Day, where these and other data will be presented.
The number of suicides is an average of 372 per year, and the number of suicide attempts is more than 6,000.
It is estimated that there is a lack of reporting on this issue, so that in practice the number of cases may be greater by about 30%.
From the discussion in the Health Committee // Knesset Channel
Since 2013, the National Suicide Prevention Program led by the Ministry of Health has been operating in Israel.
The program only works in about a third of the local authorities and it has not been expanded.
In the localities where the program operated, a 13% decrease was recorded in the number of those who ended their lives, in other places there was a 7% increase.
Despite this, the state auditor's inspection conducted in 2020 revealed that the Ministry of Health cut the program's budget by about half, from 110 to 51 million shekels.
Data from the "Ella" center, the national suicide prevention program, shows that men make up 72% of those who commit suicide.
MK Michal Waldiger, photo: Oren Ben Hakon
The average age of suicides is 42. Only 6% of all those who ended their lives were teenagers, the youngest of whom was 15. At the other end of the age scale - 7% of the suicides are 70 or older.
Deputy Minister of Finance, MK Michal Waldiger, the initiator of the suicide prevention conference: "The conference comes after a long and in-depth activity by us and the associations in the field, before and behind the scenes.
We sit and think how to reduce the painful cases of suicide.
Every tragedy is a whole world, a whole life cut short due to abysmal pain.
Hiding and silencing do not help in most cases.
On the contrary, if we know how to identify, listen and diagnose, we can prevent these disasters.
I will continue to work non-stop until finding budgets, grants and solutions that will help minimize this painful phenomenon."
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