Forgive my cynicism, but perhaps not that of the many social media commenters whose families have come through the agony of losing a loved one, and not only received no support from officialdom, but very often opposition from the Ministry of Health and their DHBs.
After refusing to hold further discussions with Nicky Stevens’ whanau six months ago, the Waikato DHB – under the new leadership of Commissioner Karen Poutasi – has changed tack and agreed to participate in mediation talks with his family.
The parents of Nicky Stevens, who died in 2015 while in the legal care of Waikato DHB’s mental health unit,…
The family of 21-year-old Nicky Stevens who died while in the care of the Waikato DHB in 2015 say they…
“What we now want is for mental health to no longer be a political football, and for all the Parliamentary parties to get their heads together around a mental health improvement programme that all of them will sign up to going into the future.”
She won’t be right mate, unless we start making it right, open up to one another, ask questions to our government about what they are doing, ask questions of ourselves as to what we can be doing.
Calling out the ‘maverick’ Logan Paul for his coverage of a Japanese suicide below Mt Fuji is hypocrisy.
How the hell does arresting a suicide victim help that person? How cruel have we become under 9 years of National that arresting suicide victims is even considered a positive step forward?
The attitude of Professor Annette Beautrais, of Canterbury University, and a suicide prevention co-ordinator for the South Canterbury DHB, is one of the primary reasons why it has been so hard to change the culture of silence about suicide, where news of it, and issues about it are swept under the carpet.
It’s far easier to ignore the 41 000 homeless, 10 000 in prison, 500 suicides, 305 000 kids in poverty, 550 000 suffering hardship and 1600 dying each year from freezing houses when you don’t know the numbers.