5 ms·

Youth Suicides Declined After Creation of National Hotline

231 points by marojejian 6mo ago

marojejian 6mo ago
gift link: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/22/science/988-youth-suicides-decline.html?unlocked_article_code=1.c1A.WCQi.QT0BEMS00Ujw&smid=url-share https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/22/science/988-youth-suicide... I bet there is so much more we could do to reduce suicides, which are a massively big problem. I wish we paid as much attention to suicide as we do to very rare mass shootings, which kill a tiny fraction of the people.
- bombcar 6mo ago
  It's important to remember that the majority of gun deaths are suicides. It's also important to remember that any blocker between a potential suicide victim and the weapon of choice reduces rates greatly. A gun locked in a safe where the potential suicide knows the code - reduces rates.
  - rolph 6mo ago
    https://www.cdc.gov/suicide/facts/data.html https://www.cdc.gov/suicide/facts/data.html the data from CDC agrees with you, and agrees that a firearm is most common method. but also indicates age correlate with freq of suicde by firearm. guess who the least frequent group is, kids. now that might fly in the face of stats, but suicide is an "intentional" thing. [that rides on the idea that you are competent to form intent when suicidal] so yes if you keep your guns secure, and gun proof your kids to mitigate accidents that should improve things, for kids. however take at least as much care for your grandparents, they are apparently at extreme risk, of forming intent and, acting especially grandpa.
    - bombcar 6mo ago
      The point of the second part is that grandpa locking up his gun reduces his risk of suicide. Anything that adds a "checkpoint" that activates even some small other part of the brain seems to help.
      - rolph 6mo ago
        yeah you got it, the reasons why it seems to be the better choice are somewhat glum. terminal illness with no quick relief in sight, an estate now the best contribution to be made vs impending medical expenses. it might work for spur of the moment almost reflex decisions, but its a different story when the choice is made over a few years, reinforced by physical reasons.
    - hirvi74 6mo ago
      > however take at least as much care for your grandparents, they are apparently at extreme risk, of forming intent and, acting especially grandpa. What if allowing suicide is taking care of one's grandparents? After all, if I was diagnosed with a awful condition like Alzheimer's, ALS, etc.. I am absolutely going out that way once I start having more bad days than good days.
      - dlev_pika 6mo ago
        That’s why we have laws protecting end of life rights in Oregon - which are much preferred over millions of firearms in the hands of ‘rEsPoNsIbLe gun oWnErS’, impulsive and impaired decision making, and someone walking into a traumatic mess coming back home.
        mystraline 6mo ago
        Most of the rest of states use hospice as a way to kill people with morphine. Basically they give the patient as much as they want, and usually stops their heart. Naturally, medically assisted suicide is illegal in most states. But its wink wink nudge nudge "pain management".
        dlev_pika 6mo ago
        I hear you - as usual, people will do what they need to do in the way they can. Personally, I wish we collectively recognized that this ‘pain management’ is a disservice to all dealing with those situations, much like handing out medical marihuana cards to recreational users was for actual patients, or women addressing family planning issues in some less than acceptable settings. Alas…
      - LorenPechtel 6mo ago
        Yeah. We focus so much on suicide without sorting out whether it's temporary despair or declining health where there is no good answer. We should be trying to help/prevent the former, for the latter I think we should only be trying to be sure they're not the former. But the data always lumps them and I get very suspicious when data lumps two very different cases.
  - Barrin92 6mo ago
    the Israeli military did a study about ~15 years ago where they looked at soldier suicide rates after they had enacted a policy of leaving the weapons at base over the weekend and if I recall correctly it cut the rate of suicides by 40-50%.
    - ajb 6mo ago
      The US Veteran's Affairs agency makes a free app to help with insomnia; it has all the usual advice that would apply to anyone - plus advising veterans not to keep a loaded gun by the bed, even if it makes them feel safer going to sleep.
    - alistairSH 6mo ago
      And on the flip side, the US Sec Def recently allowed US soldiers to carry loaded weapons on base (when not in a role that required it, which was previously disallowed). I expect this will increase suicides on US military bases. All for some "rah rah, 2A, mah rights!!!" bullshit political posturing.
      - lamasery 6mo ago
        That policy has long been a kinda funny "gee, why don't they allow it if more 'good guys with guns' make us safer?" example. I guess at least this removes that bit of rhetorical inconsistency... at, guaranteed, a notable cost in lives.
    - cucumber3732842 6mo ago
      I bet that has as much to do with where and when alcohol is consumed as it does guns.
  - skylerwiernik 6mo ago
    Interesting. What causes this? Could it have to do with the type of person to keep a gun in a safe (has kids, is more cautious in general, etc) or have studies shown that this minor friction is actually enough?
    - ceejayoz 6mo ago
      Suicide tends to be impulsive. Any friction, even brief, can give an opportunity to think twice.
      - bombcar 6mo ago
        That was the general conclusion as I recall it. Originally it was thought to be "someone else has the key" kind of things - which of course, does limit it - but even controlling for "I have to walk downstairs and find the key" reduces it.
  - throw0101d 6mo ago
    > It's also important to remember that any blocker between a potential suicide victim and the weapon of choice reduces rates greatly. A gun locked in a safe where the potential suicide knows the code - reduces rates. RAND found that minimum age requirements and child-access prevention laws reduced suicides and unintentional injuries/deaths and violent crime: * https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/child-access-prevention.html https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/child-acce... * https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/minimum-age.html https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/minimum-ag... * https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy.html https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy.html
- dfxm12 6mo ago
  It doesn't have to be a competition, and similar things, like making it harder to get a gun, introducing/enforcing laws around locking up your weapon, making mental healthcare more available (including a hotline), etc., will greatly reduce both.
- mondomondo 6mo ago
  [flagged]
  - dmoy 6mo ago
    I mean... important by what metric? Active shootings in the US kill like 100 people a year (as of 2024 I guess: https://www.fbi.gov/file-repository/reports-and-publications/2024-active-shooter-report/view https://www.fbi.gov/file-repository/reports-and-publications...) Suicides is more like 50,000/yr
    - fhdkweig 6mo ago
      That account has a -10 karma. It is just a gibberish bot.
    - shimman 6mo ago
      Yeah when you redefine the term to be "active shooter" I guess, something tells me that the American public still doesn't want to die in a mass shooting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_shootings_in_the_United_States_in_2025 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_shootings_in_the_... It's a sick society when you have one for nearly every single day of the year. But hey this is the result of neoliberal economics so why should we get too upset at the societal rot when corporatists are increasing shareholder value?
      - dmoy 6mo ago
        Ok sure, mass shooting (400) vs active shooting (100). It is still the same order of magnitude, and two orders of magnitude off of suicides (50,000). I'm not sure how that changes the point I was making, which is that suicides don't seem obviously less important.
      - cucumber3732842 6mo ago
        The terminology was specifically to counter the slight of hand you just did. Over time the definition of "mass shooting" kept getting watered down to include a lot of "normal criminals with normal criminal goals they are trying to further by killing" shootings by people who wanted the number to be bigger to mislead the public into thinking indiscriminately targeted, killing for the sake of killing type shootings perpetrated by people who are mentally ill are much more common than they are in order to push various policies. So then the people concerned with studying the latter had to come up with a new term that only encompassed people going off the deep end and did not include normal crime hence "active shooting"
- hirvi74 6mo ago
  > I bet there is so much more we could do to reduce suicides I am absolutely certain that is the case, however, society operates with such demands from individuals that a majority of necessary changes would be adamantly fought against by those which stand to benefit from the suffering. Having been through the whole mental health treatment gamut in the USA, I am convinced the only goal of the system is to patch people up just enough that they can be churned back into the capitalist machine. What makes things even sicker, is that one's health insurance is often tied to their employment, so in order to receive basically any treatment, one is typically required to be employed and working.
- GuinansEyebrows 6mo ago
  this is a really weird comparison to make given that the US has basically made no material progress on policy that could prevent mass shootings. they're both really really bad things. they both deserve as much attention as we can afford (which is more than they get). not to just jump down your throat -- i agree with you about more needing to be done to prevent suicides though. i think it's a good thing that hotlines are available but it's clear that putting the onus on people who are considering suicide to reach out for help is not enough. we gotta get better at reaching out and checking on our friends, loved ones, coworkers etc and help them carry the load more than we're culturally accustomed to.
  - fhn 6mo ago
    in your opinion, what policy should be made because whatever policy you make won't do much as long as guns exist?
    - GuinansEyebrows 6mo ago
      are you asking me, a numbskull with an associate's degree, to propose public policy*? i think we're allowed to want qualified people to do better in the positions we've elected them to :) * if so, my policy is that all guns be vaporized overnight. also, my policy would include the end of lobbying entirely, including but not limited to the small arms industry and the NRA along with police guilds and other organizations supporting the small arms race in this country
    - array_key_first 6mo ago
      Policy still matters even if guns exist. After all, murder is still illegal even though murderers exist. Building a bomb is still illegal even though bombs exist. The tricky part with the US is the already vast supply of firearms circulating. Can't do much about that. But, I would think, stopping or reducing the sale of guns right now would still have an effect. We already somewhat regularly try to reduce the sale of guns via policy, mostly to people we think are potentially dangerous. But, I don't know exactly how much that has helped, or will help. What I do know is there is definitely variance in gun violence. Both across nations, but also across states in the US. So, something is behind it.
- mystraline 6mo ago
  So yeah, why not? Choosing to end thyself IS the penultimate "my body, my choice". We have immediate "no money, lost job, destitute" (insert temporary issue). And we have chronic, everpresent, or terminal problem. We could fix the first one, but socially we choose not to. Either way, we should have the right of bodily autonomy. I guess the american answer is, for a suicide help call, show up with pigs with guns, and shoot them for disorderly conduct?
  - alistairSH 6mo ago
    The phrase "suicide by cop" didn't create itself out of thin air.
    - mystraline 6mo ago
      Well, thats usually relegated by someone who wants to die but is too scared to do it. So they find people who legally can, usually by waving an empty gun around. But what I'm seeing is 60% of the people here in the USA are not functionally sustainable economically wise. And that is completely a fixable problem. But given how corrupted our government is, its likely not going to be fixed in the reasonable future (say, 20y). Live in poverty, no medical, no vacation, scraping by every day on what amounts of hope? I can understand why people want out. HN people are in a massive bubble. Most of us are fine. Average folks? Nope. Rural? Nope. Inner city? Nope. Homeless? Obviously not. Underage LGBTQ people with hateful/christian families? One of the highest suicide rates. Sure, I would absolutely rather help people through what seems to be insurmountable problems. Most of them aren't. But seriously, this country doesnt give a fuck. I'm pretty sure this country only cares about suicide at all is because it reduces lifetime tax revenue (for, primarily blowing up brown and middle eastern people). Thankfully, 1FA is still in the USA, mostly. So sites like https://sanctionedsuicide.site https://sanctionedsuicide.site, even if theyre indexed to hell and back by Google and Bing. Id rather help people get past why they think suicide is the answer. But I also understand why someone is just tired and done.
      - deleted 6mo ago
        [deleted]
miltonlost 6mo ago
[flagged]
- daheza 6mo ago
  Incredibly sad to see and watch. Do what you can to support marginalized folks out there. When I do any kind of political / charitable donation, my wife gets to make an equal one to any organization of her choice and often chooses the Trevor project which makes me incredibly proud of her.
ceejayoz 6mo ago
About a year ago: https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/trump-shuts-down-lgbtq-youth-suicide-hotline-rcna219090 https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/trump-shuts-down-lg... > The Trump administration on Thursday afternoon officially terminated the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline’s LGBTQ Youth Specialized Services program, which gave callers under age 25 the option to speak with LGBTQ-trained counselors. As with the USAID cuts, this killed people.
- Alupis 6mo ago
  [flagged]
  - ceejayoz 6mo ago
    By that logic, pediatricians and gynecologists shouldn't exist. > A national hotline that can handle anyone is clearly the right way. Absolutely. That describes this setup. You call the number. You get help. Sometimes that means a person trained in, say, talking to rape victims. (If you go to the ER, they'll have a nurse trained in it too!) Per the article: "Also known as the 'Press 3 option,' the program gave 988 callers the option to 'press 3' to connect with a counselor trained to assist lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer youths and young adults (they could also text 988 with the word 'PRIDE'). Nearly 1.5 million contacts were routed to the LGBTQ service since its launch, according to data available on the SAMHSA website." Same hotline, just a phone tree option in it.
    - pfannkuchen 6mo ago
      > pediatricians and gynecologists Those are physical differences. Which isn’t to say that you’re wrong, but we could easily have different things for physical differences and not for mental differences. Should we have different prisons for gays? Same logic, no?
      - ceejayoz 6mo ago
        > Those are physical differences. Good; we agree differences in a patient/customer may require special training/handling. > Should we have different prisons for gays? Again, this wasn't a different hotline. Just a phone tree option. I suspect prisons, at times, have to manage things specific to gay inmates. Seems like it could cause roommate situations to be accounted for, as an example.
shevy-java 6mo ago
Personally I never called any such hotline; my assumption was that suicidal thoughts originate from one's own brain and way of thinking - adjust that and these issues would go away. Unfortunately, while this can work (for me it worked extremely well, though I should also say, I don't have suicidal thoughts to begin with, even more so as one's lifespan is finite anyway - but I do understand those who have a terminal illness, to not have to go through more suffering when something is uncurable), there are people for whom it can not work, often in the way how their brain works. Just like some people have seizures, brains are different too. It puts some responsibility on those who receive such calls, because the caller may be in a state where any additional negative input could push that caller over the edge, due to their current state of mind. So this kind of requires more training even of casual people, just as people are expected to know the basic steps necessary for first aid (on a fresh accident site, for instance). It seems pretty clear that those on the national hotline, must have had professional training too. So if there is a decline of suicides, this is most likely - and logically - due to the work by those who take up the phones.
- Forgeties79 6mo ago
  This is bootstraps by another name. “Just (don’t) do it” belongs in nike commercials, not in discussions surrounding behavioral health. If it were that simple then we wouldn’t have these issues at this scale in the first place. Nancy Reagan “just say no” comes to mind.
- Jtsummers 6mo ago
  This is a fantastically ridiculously comment. > my assumption was that suicidal thoughts originate from one's own brain and way of thinking - adjust that and these issues would go away. Unfortunately, while this can work (for me it worked extremely well, though I should also say, I don't have suicidal thoughts to begin with You're, in this comment and the part I quoted, saying that adjusting your thinking worked well for you (with the implication that it worked well in dealing with suicidal thoughts), but you say you don't have the problem (suicidal thoughts or ideation) under discussion. This is like saying, "I've heard that you can walk it off when you break your leg, and that's worked for me, but I've never actually had a broken leg." Complete nonsense.
nyanmatt 6mo ago
I don’t see how. Have you ever tried calling one of these lines in a suicide emergency? Things I’ve learned in California: - an ambulance will not be dispatched unless you physically witness someone trying to kill themselves - otherwise, they send the police - the police arrive without training and severely escalate the situation - the person having an emergency will be taken into custody and stripped of rights until being medically evaluated (not arrested) This is the program of an allegedly progressive state. After 2 experiences like this, adding trauma to already traumatic situations, I would never recommend these hotlines.
- wakamoleguy 6mo ago
  And yet the data shows that they did decline. I'm sure they could be much better, and the response will vary from state to state.
- ceejayoz 6mo ago
  I have a loved one who used the 988 hotline several times. None of them resulted in police intervention. Our county has a mobile crisis team of social workers who show up and get you connected to services.
  - spwa4 6mo ago
    ... services that use force against individuals. Never ever, ever tell a social worker of any kind that you think of suicide, or that anyone else does. ESPECIALLY not if you're young. Help, or social worker's kind of help, does not help. And getting rid of social workers ... I almost killed one before that happened. All the lip service they make to that force is not the answer. It's lies, cheats and deception on their part, nothing more. Once on a forced youth services vacation I locked, with an entire group, a social services worker into a room. She became instantly educated why locking the rooms was a bad idea, why not even having a lock on the inside was an incredible mistake, and why youth workers ignoring screaming in the facility was an incredibly bad idea. All these people want is to be the big man (yes, including the 19 year old women who join), and you cannot explain it to them. After she eventually got out, we never saw her again, and the others were a LOT more flexible. And that wasn't even close to the worst that happened. These things is what social services calls "protection". They purposefully create situations where Gandhi would eventually beat up his own mother, and call it protection. Don't do this to people.
nxobject 6mo ago
It's good to celebrate this... but, looking forward, it's worrying to think whether kiddos these days are going first to ChatGPT instead, of, well, the hotline (or real people!) I think there's genuine value in going to an AI -- as long as you think of it as "interactive journaling", and not a human relationship. But, will they encourage struggling kiddos to make the leap and ask for support from an actual person?
- inetknght 6mo ago
  > will they encourage struggling kiddos to make the leap and ask for support from an actual person? Where's the profit in that?
- malfist 6mo ago
  > I think there's genuine value in going to an AI What's it going to do, help them avoid passive voice in their suicide note? Encourage them to carry it out? Hype them up about suicide? Tell them they're absolutely correct?
  - nxobject 6mo ago
    Honestly? As a veteran journaler who’s struggled with depression, I’ve always wanted an “organize everything that I splurted out today while I was overwhelmed” feature. I guess the question is: can we encourage kids to use AI to help organize their thoughts and reflections, while avoiding just looking for cheap affirmation? I dunno - we’re not prepared to teach AI literacy at that level.
umpalumpaaa 6mo ago
A while ago I was seriously sick + in a hospital (for a few months). The doctors told me that I won't be able to resume my regular job (software engineer). At the same time I was in a lot of pain – unable to sit, walk, stand. It was not really clear how it all would end. I got deeply depressed and just wanted to die. The pain was just too much - even with controlled pain medication in a hospital setup. I called the German crisis hotline almost every night and they were usually very very helpful. They listened - sometimes for 1-2 hours. In 90% of my calls I felt way better after calling them. They really are well trained and some of the personalities I talked to were pretty impressive and interesting… They have seen a lot…
- keybored 6mo ago
  I’m glad that it helped and that it worked for such a seemingly somatic issue. I wouldn’t have thought that.
  - washadjeffmad 6mo ago
    That's understandable. I went through a period of chronic pain and, had it continued, I likely wouldn't be alive today. The mechanisms protecting us from non-existence by millions of years of evolution can be eroded by pain. It's not something you realize you even have to lose until you've experienced it firsthand. I certainly never expected it, and it's hard for me to imagine what I'd intended while going through it.
    - Eddy_Viscosity2 6mo ago
      The pain doesn't even have to be physical for this same erosion effect to occur.
  - jodacola 6mo ago
    I just listened to a fascinating podcast episode of Armchair Expert on pain psychology that went into such topics [0]. May not be some folks’ cup of tea, but I was sucked in and want to study more. [0] https://armchairexpertpod.com/pods/rachel-zoffness https://armchairexpertpod.com/pods/rachel-zoffness
ed_balls 6mo ago
Something I read recently really stuck with me: giving people methylphenidate or other stimulants may lower the risk of a second suicide attempt by around 25%.
declan_roberts 6mo ago
One sad fact I learned about adolescent suicide (12 to 18 years of age) is that it's seasonal. It picks up during the school year and drops precipitously during summer and winter vacations. Being in school has a profound impact on whether or not a child wants to kill themselves. http://basilhalperin.com/essays/school-and-teen-suicide.html http://basilhalperin.com/essays/school-and-teen-suicide.html
- tombert 6mo ago
  I wasn't suicidal when I was in high school, but I absolutely understand people's depression around the school year. I actually don't hate school as much as an adult, but I really did view school like a prison when I was a teenager. I didn't like homework, I didn't like most of my teachers, I liked learning but due to the fact that schools have to go at a pace slow enough for the dumbest person they want to pass, I would get very bored during class, and so high school in general was existentially dreadful every day. Even when I got home, I would dread the fact that in about ~15 hours, I would have to go back to school again. It didn't help that there was a dread with grades in general; I wasn't abused or anything, and I think my parents in general were pretty ok at parenting, but as report card season came nearer and nearer, I would get more and more depressed, because when I would inevitably get middling-to-bad grades, I would get a lecture and/or grounded by my parents. This meant no computer, no games, I wasn't allowed to hang out with my friends, and they hoped that it would force me to study more. It's not dumb logic, but it just didn't work. I would just be sad and angry and still wouldn't do the homework. No doubt a large chunk of this was just hormonal, but I really think that the typical American school system is not a good fit for a lot of people, myself included. I don't think anyone has ever seriously called me stupid, but I would be in camp that endlessly frustrated teachers: I would do well on the tests, I would do well on the AP exams, no one disputed that I understood the course material well enough, but I just didn't care enough to do the homework so they would be forced to give me bad grades. I don't blame the teachers for this at all, they're just doing their jobs. Despite being in AP classes and having skipped two grades in math, I was seriously considering dropping out of high school and just trying for the GED so I wouldn't have to go anymore, and I probably would have done that if I didn't think that my parents would freak out. I didn't want to kill myself, but very few things brought me more joy in my life than knowing I wouldn't ever have to go back to high school again. I know a lot of people say that these are the best times of their lives, and power to them for that, but they were decidedly not for me.
renewiltord 6mo ago
[flagged]
- ceejayoz 6mo ago
  > All I know is that if I call this, they're going to wellness-check me... https://www.cbsnews.com/news/will-988-call-the-police-data-suggests-rarely/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/will-988-call-the-police-data-s... "Many people in mental health crisis fear that if they dial 988, law enforcement might show up or they might be forced to go to the hospital. But getting sent that kind of 'involuntary emergency rescue' happens to around 1% of callers, suggests new data from Vibrant Emotional Health, the administrator of the 988 Lifeline for suicide and mental health crises."
  - renewiltord 6mo ago
    Nah he’s bullshitting. It’s 1% of calls, not callers. If you’re in the 1% you’re not making another call. If you’re in the 99% you get to call again tomorrow. Listen, if you want to check your wellness be my guest. I won’t be.
NalNezumi 6mo ago
[dead]
Cytobit 6mo ago
If we want people to feel safe talking about suicidal thoughts, we need to rework the involuntary commitment laws. As it is now, a person has every reason to be fearful about opening up. You can be imprisoned, humiliated, and medicated against your will, all without due process of law, just because you were careless with your words.
- esbranson 6mo ago
  Murderers who are declared insane by a court aren't even involuntary committed for lengthy periods of time.

231 points by marojejian 6mo ago

gift link: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/22/science/988-youth-suicides-decline.html?unlocked_article_code=1.c1A.WCQi.QT0BEMS00Ujw&smid=url-share https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/22/science/988-youth-suicide... I bet there is so much more we could do to reduce suicides, which are a massively big problem. I wish we paid as much attention to suicide as we do to very rare mass shootings, which kill a tiny fraction of the people.

bombcar 6mo ago
It's important to remember that the majority of gun deaths are suicides. It's also important to remember that any blocker between a potential suicide victim and the weapon of choice reduces rates greatly. A gun locked in a safe where the potential suicide knows the code - reduces rates.
- rolph 6mo ago
  https://www.cdc.gov/suicide/facts/data.html https://www.cdc.gov/suicide/facts/data.html the data from CDC agrees with you, and agrees that a firearm is most common method. but also indicates age correlate with freq of suicde by firearm. guess who the least frequent group is, kids. now that might fly in the face of stats, but suicide is an "intentional" thing. [that rides on the idea that you are competent to form intent when suicidal] so yes if you keep your guns secure, and gun proof your kids to mitigate accidents that should improve things, for kids. however take at least as much care for your grandparents, they are apparently at extreme risk, of forming intent and, acting especially grandpa.
  - bombcar 6mo ago
    The point of the second part is that grandpa locking up his gun reduces his risk of suicide. Anything that adds a "checkpoint" that activates even some small other part of the brain seems to help.
    - rolph 6mo ago
      yeah you got it, the reasons why it seems to be the better choice are somewhat glum. terminal illness with no quick relief in sight, an estate now the best contribution to be made vs impending medical expenses. it might work for spur of the moment almost reflex decisions, but its a different story when the choice is made over a few years, reinforced by physical reasons.
  - hirvi74 6mo ago
    > however take at least as much care for your grandparents, they are apparently at extreme risk, of forming intent and, acting especially grandpa. What if allowing suicide is taking care of one's grandparents? After all, if I was diagnosed with a awful condition like Alzheimer's, ALS, etc.. I am absolutely going out that way once I start having more bad days than good days.
    - dlev_pika 6mo ago
      That’s why we have laws protecting end of life rights in Oregon - which are much preferred over millions of firearms in the hands of ‘rEsPoNsIbLe gun oWnErS’, impulsive and impaired decision making, and someone walking into a traumatic mess coming back home.
      - mystraline 6mo ago
        Most of the rest of states use hospice as a way to kill people with morphine. Basically they give the patient as much as they want, and usually stops their heart. Naturally, medically assisted suicide is illegal in most states. But its wink wink nudge nudge "pain management".
        dlev_pika 6mo ago
        I hear you - as usual, people will do what they need to do in the way they can. Personally, I wish we collectively recognized that this ‘pain management’ is a disservice to all dealing with those situations, much like handing out medical marihuana cards to recreational users was for actual patients, or women addressing family planning issues in some less than acceptable settings. Alas…
    - LorenPechtel 6mo ago
      Yeah. We focus so much on suicide without sorting out whether it's temporary despair or declining health where there is no good answer. We should be trying to help/prevent the former, for the latter I think we should only be trying to be sure they're not the former. But the data always lumps them and I get very suspicious when data lumps two very different cases.
- Barrin92 6mo ago
  the Israeli military did a study about ~15 years ago where they looked at soldier suicide rates after they had enacted a policy of leaving the weapons at base over the weekend and if I recall correctly it cut the rate of suicides by 40-50%.
  - ajb 6mo ago
    The US Veteran's Affairs agency makes a free app to help with insomnia; it has all the usual advice that would apply to anyone - plus advising veterans not to keep a loaded gun by the bed, even if it makes them feel safer going to sleep.
  - alistairSH 6mo ago
    And on the flip side, the US Sec Def recently allowed US soldiers to carry loaded weapons on base (when not in a role that required it, which was previously disallowed). I expect this will increase suicides on US military bases. All for some "rah rah, 2A, mah rights!!!" bullshit political posturing.
    - lamasery 6mo ago
      That policy has long been a kinda funny "gee, why don't they allow it if more 'good guys with guns' make us safer?" example. I guess at least this removes that bit of rhetorical inconsistency... at, guaranteed, a notable cost in lives.
  - cucumber3732842 6mo ago
    I bet that has as much to do with where and when alcohol is consumed as it does guns.
- skylerwiernik 6mo ago
  Interesting. What causes this? Could it have to do with the type of person to keep a gun in a safe (has kids, is more cautious in general, etc) or have studies shown that this minor friction is actually enough?
  - ceejayoz 6mo ago
    Suicide tends to be impulsive. Any friction, even brief, can give an opportunity to think twice.
    - bombcar 6mo ago
      That was the general conclusion as I recall it. Originally it was thought to be "someone else has the key" kind of things - which of course, does limit it - but even controlling for "I have to walk downstairs and find the key" reduces it.
- throw0101d 6mo ago
  > It's also important to remember that any blocker between a potential suicide victim and the weapon of choice reduces rates greatly. A gun locked in a safe where the potential suicide knows the code - reduces rates. RAND found that minimum age requirements and child-access prevention laws reduced suicides and unintentional injuries/deaths and violent crime: * https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/child-access-prevention.html https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/child-acce... * https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/minimum-age.html https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/minimum-ag... * https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy.html https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy.html
dfxm12 6mo ago
It doesn't have to be a competition, and similar things, like making it harder to get a gun, introducing/enforcing laws around locking up your weapon, making mental healthcare more available (including a hotline), etc., will greatly reduce both.
mondomondo 6mo ago
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- dmoy 6mo ago
  I mean... important by what metric? Active shootings in the US kill like 100 people a year (as of 2024 I guess: https://www.fbi.gov/file-repository/reports-and-publications/2024-active-shooter-report/view https://www.fbi.gov/file-repository/reports-and-publications...) Suicides is more like 50,000/yr
  - fhdkweig 6mo ago
    That account has a -10 karma. It is just a gibberish bot.
  - shimman 6mo ago
    Yeah when you redefine the term to be "active shooter" I guess, something tells me that the American public still doesn't want to die in a mass shooting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_shootings_in_the_United_States_in_2025 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_shootings_in_the_... It's a sick society when you have one for nearly every single day of the year. But hey this is the result of neoliberal economics so why should we get too upset at the societal rot when corporatists are increasing shareholder value?
    - dmoy 6mo ago
      Ok sure, mass shooting (400) vs active shooting (100). It is still the same order of magnitude, and two orders of magnitude off of suicides (50,000). I'm not sure how that changes the point I was making, which is that suicides don't seem obviously less important.
    - cucumber3732842 6mo ago
      The terminology was specifically to counter the slight of hand you just did. Over time the definition of "mass shooting" kept getting watered down to include a lot of "normal criminals with normal criminal goals they are trying to further by killing" shootings by people who wanted the number to be bigger to mislead the public into thinking indiscriminately targeted, killing for the sake of killing type shootings perpetrated by people who are mentally ill are much more common than they are in order to push various policies. So then the people concerned with studying the latter had to come up with a new term that only encompassed people going off the deep end and did not include normal crime hence "active shooting"
hirvi74 6mo ago
> I bet there is so much more we could do to reduce suicides I am absolutely certain that is the case, however, society operates with such demands from individuals that a majority of necessary changes would be adamantly fought against by those which stand to benefit from the suffering. Having been through the whole mental health treatment gamut in the USA, I am convinced the only goal of the system is to patch people up just enough that they can be churned back into the capitalist machine. What makes things even sicker, is that one's health insurance is often tied to their employment, so in order to receive basically any treatment, one is typically required to be employed and working.
GuinansEyebrows 6mo ago
this is a really weird comparison to make given that the US has basically made no material progress on policy that could prevent mass shootings. they're both really really bad things. they both deserve as much attention as we can afford (which is more than they get). not to just jump down your throat -- i agree with you about more needing to be done to prevent suicides though. i think it's a good thing that hotlines are available but it's clear that putting the onus on people who are considering suicide to reach out for help is not enough. we gotta get better at reaching out and checking on our friends, loved ones, coworkers etc and help them carry the load more than we're culturally accustomed to.
- fhn 6mo ago
  in your opinion, what policy should be made because whatever policy you make won't do much as long as guns exist?
  - GuinansEyebrows 6mo ago
    are you asking me, a numbskull with an associate's degree, to propose public policy*? i think we're allowed to want qualified people to do better in the positions we've elected them to :) * if so, my policy is that all guns be vaporized overnight. also, my policy would include the end of lobbying entirely, including but not limited to the small arms industry and the NRA along with police guilds and other organizations supporting the small arms race in this country
  - array_key_first 6mo ago
    Policy still matters even if guns exist. After all, murder is still illegal even though murderers exist. Building a bomb is still illegal even though bombs exist. The tricky part with the US is the already vast supply of firearms circulating. Can't do much about that. But, I would think, stopping or reducing the sale of guns right now would still have an effect. We already somewhat regularly try to reduce the sale of guns via policy, mostly to people we think are potentially dangerous. But, I don't know exactly how much that has helped, or will help. What I do know is there is definitely variance in gun violence. Both across nations, but also across states in the US. So, something is behind it.
mystraline 6mo ago
So yeah, why not? Choosing to end thyself IS the penultimate "my body, my choice". We have immediate "no money, lost job, destitute" (insert temporary issue). And we have chronic, everpresent, or terminal problem. We could fix the first one, but socially we choose not to. Either way, we should have the right of bodily autonomy. I guess the american answer is, for a suicide help call, show up with pigs with guns, and shoot them for disorderly conduct?
- alistairSH 6mo ago
  The phrase "suicide by cop" didn't create itself out of thin air.
  - mystraline 6mo ago
    Well, thats usually relegated by someone who wants to die but is too scared to do it. So they find people who legally can, usually by waving an empty gun around. But what I'm seeing is 60% of the people here in the USA are not functionally sustainable economically wise. And that is completely a fixable problem. But given how corrupted our government is, its likely not going to be fixed in the reasonable future (say, 20y). Live in poverty, no medical, no vacation, scraping by every day on what amounts of hope? I can understand why people want out. HN people are in a massive bubble. Most of us are fine. Average folks? Nope. Rural? Nope. Inner city? Nope. Homeless? Obviously not. Underage LGBTQ people with hateful/christian families? One of the highest suicide rates. Sure, I would absolutely rather help people through what seems to be insurmountable problems. Most of them aren't. But seriously, this country doesnt give a fuck. I'm pretty sure this country only cares about suicide at all is because it reduces lifetime tax revenue (for, primarily blowing up brown and middle eastern people). Thankfully, 1FA is still in the USA, mostly. So sites like https://sanctionedsuicide.site https://sanctionedsuicide.site, even if theyre indexed to hell and back by Google and Bing. Id rather help people get past why they think suicide is the answer. But I also understand why someone is just tired and done.
    - deleted 6mo ago
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miltonlost 6mo ago

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daheza 6mo ago
Incredibly sad to see and watch. Do what you can to support marginalized folks out there. When I do any kind of political / charitable donation, my wife gets to make an equal one to any organization of her choice and often chooses the Trevor project which makes me incredibly proud of her.

ceejayoz 6mo ago

About a year ago: https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/trump-shuts-down-lgbtq-youth-suicide-hotline-rcna219090 https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/trump-shuts-down-lg... > The Trump administration on Thursday afternoon officially terminated the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline’s LGBTQ Youth Specialized Services program, which gave callers under age 25 the option to speak with LGBTQ-trained counselors. As with the USAID cuts, this killed people.

Alupis 6mo ago
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- ceejayoz 6mo ago
  By that logic, pediatricians and gynecologists shouldn't exist. > A national hotline that can handle anyone is clearly the right way. Absolutely. That describes this setup. You call the number. You get help. Sometimes that means a person trained in, say, talking to rape victims. (If you go to the ER, they'll have a nurse trained in it too!) Per the article: "Also known as the 'Press 3 option,' the program gave 988 callers the option to 'press 3' to connect with a counselor trained to assist lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer youths and young adults (they could also text 988 with the word 'PRIDE'). Nearly 1.5 million contacts were routed to the LGBTQ service since its launch, according to data available on the SAMHSA website." Same hotline, just a phone tree option in it.
  - pfannkuchen 6mo ago
    > pediatricians and gynecologists Those are physical differences. Which isn’t to say that you’re wrong, but we could easily have different things for physical differences and not for mental differences. Should we have different prisons for gays? Same logic, no?
    - ceejayoz 6mo ago
      > Those are physical differences. Good; we agree differences in a patient/customer may require special training/handling. > Should we have different prisons for gays? Again, this wasn't a different hotline. Just a phone tree option. I suspect prisons, at times, have to manage things specific to gay inmates. Seems like it could cause roommate situations to be accounted for, as an example.

shevy-java 6mo ago

Personally I never called any such hotline; my assumption was that suicidal thoughts originate from one's own brain and way of thinking - adjust that and these issues would go away. Unfortunately, while this can work (for me it worked extremely well, though I should also say, I don't have suicidal thoughts to begin with, even more so as one's lifespan is finite anyway - but I do understand those who have a terminal illness, to not have to go through more suffering when something is uncurable), there are people for whom it can not work, often in the way how their brain works. Just like some people have seizures, brains are different too. It puts some responsibility on those who receive such calls, because the caller may be in a state where any additional negative input could push that caller over the edge, due to their current state of mind. So this kind of requires more training even of casual people, just as people are expected to know the basic steps necessary for first aid (on a fresh accident site, for instance). It seems pretty clear that those on the national hotline, must have had professional training too. So if there is a decline of suicides, this is most likely - and logically - due to the work by those who take up the phones.

Forgeties79 6mo ago
This is bootstraps by another name. “Just (don’t) do it” belongs in nike commercials, not in discussions surrounding behavioral health. If it were that simple then we wouldn’t have these issues at this scale in the first place. Nancy Reagan “just say no” comes to mind.
Jtsummers 6mo ago
This is a fantastically ridiculously comment. > my assumption was that suicidal thoughts originate from one's own brain and way of thinking - adjust that and these issues would go away. Unfortunately, while this can work (for me it worked extremely well, though I should also say, I don't have suicidal thoughts to begin with You're, in this comment and the part I quoted, saying that adjusting your thinking worked well for you (with the implication that it worked well in dealing with suicidal thoughts), but you say you don't have the problem (suicidal thoughts or ideation) under discussion. This is like saying, "I've heard that you can walk it off when you break your leg, and that's worked for me, but I've never actually had a broken leg." Complete nonsense.

nyanmatt 6mo ago

I don’t see how. Have you ever tried calling one of these lines in a suicide emergency? Things I’ve learned in California: - an ambulance will not be dispatched unless you physically witness someone trying to kill themselves - otherwise, they send the police - the police arrive without training and severely escalate the situation - the person having an emergency will be taken into custody and stripped of rights until being medically evaluated (not arrested) This is the program of an allegedly progressive state. After 2 experiences like this, adding trauma to already traumatic situations, I would never recommend these hotlines.

wakamoleguy 6mo ago
And yet the data shows that they did decline. I'm sure they could be much better, and the response will vary from state to state.
ceejayoz 6mo ago
I have a loved one who used the 988 hotline several times. None of them resulted in police intervention. Our county has a mobile crisis team of social workers who show up and get you connected to services.
- spwa4 6mo ago
  ... services that use force against individuals. Never ever, ever tell a social worker of any kind that you think of suicide, or that anyone else does. ESPECIALLY not if you're young. Help, or social worker's kind of help, does not help. And getting rid of social workers ... I almost killed one before that happened. All the lip service they make to that force is not the answer. It's lies, cheats and deception on their part, nothing more. Once on a forced youth services vacation I locked, with an entire group, a social services worker into a room. She became instantly educated why locking the rooms was a bad idea, why not even having a lock on the inside was an incredible mistake, and why youth workers ignoring screaming in the facility was an incredibly bad idea. All these people want is to be the big man (yes, including the 19 year old women who join), and you cannot explain it to them. After she eventually got out, we never saw her again, and the others were a LOT more flexible. And that wasn't even close to the worst that happened. These things is what social services calls "protection". They purposefully create situations where Gandhi would eventually beat up his own mother, and call it protection. Don't do this to people.

nxobject 6mo ago

It's good to celebrate this... but, looking forward, it's worrying to think whether kiddos these days are going first to ChatGPT instead, of, well, the hotline (or real people!) I think there's genuine value in going to an AI -- as long as you think of it as "interactive journaling", and not a human relationship. But, will they encourage struggling kiddos to make the leap and ask for support from an actual person?

inetknght 6mo ago
> will they encourage struggling kiddos to make the leap and ask for support from an actual person? Where's the profit in that?
malfist 6mo ago
> I think there's genuine value in going to an AI What's it going to do, help them avoid passive voice in their suicide note? Encourage them to carry it out? Hype them up about suicide? Tell them they're absolutely correct?
- nxobject 6mo ago
  Honestly? As a veteran journaler who’s struggled with depression, I’ve always wanted an “organize everything that I splurted out today while I was overwhelmed” feature. I guess the question is: can we encourage kids to use AI to help organize their thoughts and reflections, while avoiding just looking for cheap affirmation? I dunno - we’re not prepared to teach AI literacy at that level.

umpalumpaaa 6mo ago

A while ago I was seriously sick + in a hospital (for a few months). The doctors told me that I won't be able to resume my regular job (software engineer). At the same time I was in a lot of pain – unable to sit, walk, stand. It was not really clear how it all would end. I got deeply depressed and just wanted to die. The pain was just too much - even with controlled pain medication in a hospital setup. I called the German crisis hotline almost every night and they were usually very very helpful. They listened - sometimes for 1-2 hours. In 90% of my calls I felt way better after calling them. They really are well trained and some of the personalities I talked to were pretty impressive and interesting… They have seen a lot…

keybored 6mo ago
I’m glad that it helped and that it worked for such a seemingly somatic issue. I wouldn’t have thought that.
- washadjeffmad 6mo ago
  That's understandable. I went through a period of chronic pain and, had it continued, I likely wouldn't be alive today. The mechanisms protecting us from non-existence by millions of years of evolution can be eroded by pain. It's not something you realize you even have to lose until you've experienced it firsthand. I certainly never expected it, and it's hard for me to imagine what I'd intended while going through it.
  - Eddy_Viscosity2 6mo ago
    The pain doesn't even have to be physical for this same erosion effect to occur.
- jodacola 6mo ago
  I just listened to a fascinating podcast episode of Armchair Expert on pain psychology that went into such topics [0]. May not be some folks’ cup of tea, but I was sucked in and want to study more. [0] https://armchairexpertpod.com/pods/rachel-zoffness https://armchairexpertpod.com/pods/rachel-zoffness

ed_balls 6mo ago

Something I read recently really stuck with me: giving people methylphenidate or other stimulants may lower the risk of a second suicide attempt by around 25%.

declan_roberts 6mo ago

One sad fact I learned about adolescent suicide (12 to 18 years of age) is that it's seasonal. It picks up during the school year and drops precipitously during summer and winter vacations. Being in school has a profound impact on whether or not a child wants to kill themselves. http://basilhalperin.com/essays/school-and-teen-suicide.html http://basilhalperin.com/essays/school-and-teen-suicide.html

tombert 6mo ago
I wasn't suicidal when I was in high school, but I absolutely understand people's depression around the school year. I actually don't hate school as much as an adult, but I really did view school like a prison when I was a teenager. I didn't like homework, I didn't like most of my teachers, I liked learning but due to the fact that schools have to go at a pace slow enough for the dumbest person they want to pass, I would get very bored during class, and so high school in general was existentially dreadful every day. Even when I got home, I would dread the fact that in about ~15 hours, I would have to go back to school again. It didn't help that there was a dread with grades in general; I wasn't abused or anything, and I think my parents in general were pretty ok at parenting, but as report card season came nearer and nearer, I would get more and more depressed, because when I would inevitably get middling-to-bad grades, I would get a lecture and/or grounded by my parents. This meant no computer, no games, I wasn't allowed to hang out with my friends, and they hoped that it would force me to study more. It's not dumb logic, but it just didn't work. I would just be sad and angry and still wouldn't do the homework. No doubt a large chunk of this was just hormonal, but I really think that the typical American school system is not a good fit for a lot of people, myself included. I don't think anyone has ever seriously called me stupid, but I would be in camp that endlessly frustrated teachers: I would do well on the tests, I would do well on the AP exams, no one disputed that I understood the course material well enough, but I just didn't care enough to do the homework so they would be forced to give me bad grades. I don't blame the teachers for this at all, they're just doing their jobs. Despite being in AP classes and having skipped two grades in math, I was seriously considering dropping out of high school and just trying for the GED so I wouldn't have to go anymore, and I probably would have done that if I didn't think that my parents would freak out. I didn't want to kill myself, but very few things brought me more joy in my life than knowing I wouldn't ever have to go back to high school again. I know a lot of people say that these are the best times of their lives, and power to them for that, but they were decidedly not for me.

renewiltord 6mo ago

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ceejayoz 6mo ago
> All I know is that if I call this, they're going to wellness-check me... https://www.cbsnews.com/news/will-988-call-the-police-data-suggests-rarely/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/will-988-call-the-police-data-s... "Many people in mental health crisis fear that if they dial 988, law enforcement might show up or they might be forced to go to the hospital. But getting sent that kind of 'involuntary emergency rescue' happens to around 1% of callers, suggests new data from Vibrant Emotional Health, the administrator of the 988 Lifeline for suicide and mental health crises."
- renewiltord 6mo ago
  Nah he’s bullshitting. It’s 1% of calls, not callers. If you’re in the 1% you’re not making another call. If you’re in the 99% you get to call again tomorrow. Listen, if you want to check your wellness be my guest. I won’t be.

NalNezumi 6mo ago

[dead]

Cytobit 6mo ago

If we want people to feel safe talking about suicidal thoughts, we need to rework the involuntary commitment laws. As it is now, a person has every reason to be fearful about opening up. You can be imprisoned, humiliated, and medicated against your will, all without due process of law, just because you were careless with your words.

esbranson 6mo ago
Murderers who are declared insane by a court aren't even involuntary committed for lengthy periods of time.