San Diego County Suicide Rate Continues To Climb

Speaker 1: 00:00 The number of deaths by suicide continues a slow climb in San Diego. In keeping with national suicide prevention week, the county has released new statistics showing an increase in suicides for a fourth year in a row. The goal of the county suicide prevention council remains the same and that is getting to zero suicides. But as the new numbers show, that goal remains elusive. Journey may is Stan Collins who aside prevention specialist with the San Diego County Suicide Prevention Council. Stan, welcome to the program. Speaker 2: 00:32 Thanks so much for having me. Speaker 1: 00:33 One of the things that jumped out at me in this report is that you say suicide is one of the leading causes of death in the county. Where does it rank in comparison to, let's say, traffic accidents or heart failure? Speaker 2: 00:47 So it's interesting and there's actually about a hundred more suicides than there are car accident deaths each year. So a Su suicide is one, if not the leading cause of non-natural death, one of the top three leading causes of non-natural death, and it's in the top 10 of causes. Overall, Speaker 1: 01:02 the council's annual report shows that 465 people died by suicide and San Diego County last year. That's about seven more than reported in 2017. Could the slow increase that we're seeing over the last few years just be attributed to population growth? Speaker 2: 01:20 Actually, it's not consistent with population growth. So, um, over the past decade or so as we see the most significant climbs, uh, some of the population was actually pretty hold holding pretty steady. Um, so it's not simply attributed to population and the trends and increase we've seen across the state and actually nationally. So there's nothing unique about San Diego as far as an increase in suicides just here locally. Speaker 1: 01:41 So what is causing this increase? Do we have any kind of handle on that? Speaker 2: 01:45 I don't think, I think as a suicide loss survivor myself, we oftentimes try to look for that cause what is the why in this conversation? And I think it's too complex to simplify down to one thing. Um, since 2007, 2008, we ha that's really where we started to see the increase begin. So you could of course, anecdotally attributed to the recession and some of the financial issues, but suicide is really much more complex than that. And so it's really such an individual basis about what's going on in that person's life. So rather than looking at the causes, what I tried to focus on, because we can't prevent bad things from happening in people's lives, what we can do is help make people more resilient, to respond to whatever it is that comes into their life. Speaker 1: 02:25 Now the report highlights what you call means reduction strategies. Can you explain what that means and maybe give us an example? Yeah. Speaker 2: 02:33 So what we know is that restricting access to lethal means is one of the most research proven strategies for reducing suicides. And to simplify it, it's this, it's putting distance and time between somebody who's having thoughts of suicide and, and the means, lethal means to make a suicide attempt. And the more distance and space you can put, the more opportunity you have for intervention, the more opportunity you have for that person to choose a different path. And so specifically today we highlighted three separate efforts. Um, over the last few years there's been a lot of momentum to put a barrier along the cornetto bridge. We also have a partnership with Ucs d school of pharmacy where all of the students are invited to learn about suicide prevention as our best practice, as a skill for going in the field of pharmacy. And I'm really excited about the, the last one which has stopped firearm suicide, San Diego. Speaker 2: 03:20 So over the past year I've been working with a variety of gun shops and ranges across the county and I would really want to give a shout out to Poway weapons and gear. They have really been one of the leaders in this effort. So with the firearm suicide stop, firearm suicide, San Diego component with Poway weapons and gear specifically, as an example, they are providing materials on suicide prevention with every gun sale. They're training their staff in suicide prevention. And what's really fascinating and exciting is that they are also including information on suicide prevention and their firearm safety courses. So through that, through all those efforts that are going to reach anywhere from 10 to 15,000 firearm owners every year with information about suicide prevention and unfortunately firearm is the leading cause or the leading means of suicide deaths here in San Diego. Speaker 1: 04:03 Are you also advocating for any kind of gun reform legislation to go along with that piece? Speaker 2: 04:09 So that's a tricky issue. Um, I think there will be people on both sides of the fence within the suicide prevention community. I personally come from a family of, of law enforcement. I'm a gun owner myself. And so I believe that rather than coming to this as adversaries, I think it's more important that we focus on how can we ally and how can we agree. And I think it's important that people are aware of efforts such as the gun violence restraining order, but more important than that, I think we need to look at the least restrictive means. And so one of the things we're doing through the gun shop project is, uh, Poway weapons. A gear again is one of our partners where they're offering discounts on storage for individuals who have maybe a family member or themselves or going through a hard time and so there's other gun shops around the county who are offering discounted rates for people to store their firearms. A lot of people don't even know that if, if you need to get the firearms out of the home for a little while, you can take them to a gun shop and store them until the situation and the crisis resolves. Speaker 1: 05:03 And if someone is out there in pain and thinking about suicide, what should they do? Speaker 2: 05:07 I think they should reach out for support. They should talk to friends and family. They can also call the access and crisis line (888) 724-7240. But I think it also starts with having some accountability and ourselves to not be afraid to talk about suicide. If you are worried that someone in your life is having a hard time or maybe thinking about suicide, ask directly, are you thinking about suicide? And if the answer is yes, make sure that you're getting, getting them connected to the appropriate help, and again, making sure that you're reducing that access to lethal means. Speaker 1: 05:37 I've been speaking with Stan Colin, suicide prevention specialist with the San Diego County Suicide Prevention Council. Stan, thanks a lot. Thank you. Speaker 3: 05:53 [inaudible].