SUICIDE PREVENTION SERVICE SUCCEEDS

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28980, 22 August 1959, Page 10

SUICIDE PREVENTION SERVICE SUCCEEDS

Extension Of Unusual Telephone Ministry

(Specially Written for ••The Press” by the Rev. KEITH CREE] “BEFORE you commit suicide, ring me up.” This •D announcement appeared in a London newspaper a few years ago and led to the extension of an unusual telephone ministry.

Helsingborg, London, Berlin and Vienna were ’ the first European cities to start this ministry, which was largely a suicide prevention service. Soon they were followed by Frankfurt, Zurich, Binning- . ham, Rotterdam, St. Galle, Hamburg, Dusseldorf and others.

The ministry spread across the Atlantic. In New York about 20,000 people ring one of the four centres every day—in Los Angeles 10,000, in San Francisco 3500—t0 ask for information, advice and help. In European countries where this service exists, however, the number of daily telephone calls is less; the ministry in Berlin receives only 10 to 50 calls a day. What began as a suicide prevention service, the concerned activity of a Christian minister, has extended until now in many centres not only ministers and priests sit at a telephone to give counsel, but a host of specialists psychological and otherwise, are on call. Social workers and laymen and laywomen have been enlisted in this service which began as an extension of a pastoral ministry. It might be asked, who are the people who ring up the telephone ministry, and why do they call? The answers have been given by one who should know, especially from the European scene, for the Rev. Klaus Thomas, M.D., Ph.D., was the man who founded the telephone ministry in Berlin some years ago. Dr. Thomas lists four main groups of persons who use the telephone to secure help. The first group covers nearly half of the cases. These are people with acute personal problems, many of them marital, who seek an interview. Some are timid and unprepared to talk face to face unless they are sure the person at the other end will be sympathetic. By telephoning first they can always cut off the conversation by hanging up the receiver. Where some haven’t the courage to go to a church or a minister’s residence, they can seek advice by telephone. “ What Shall I Do ? ” A second group is made up of those who end up by asking, “What shall I do?" These persons may not be desperate, but they are canny, for it costs nothing to dial a number but a fee is required to visit a lawyer. Many of them are ignorant, especially in matters .of laws which they have broken. In this group are some who are straight-out cadgers, and who learn very soon that this telephone ministry does not extend to giving financial aid. A third group of persons may be described as being in need of consolation. Even the telephone can reveal ■ vast amount of hidden sorrow—perhaps a woman in pain, a bereaved person with no-one who cares, a victim of a swindler, someone old and lonely or blind and handicapped. The ever-recurring question of most of these people is : “Is there nobody who cares?" Consolation can be given over the wire and ways opened for social contacts that take the loneliness from many a solitary life. The last and most important group of callers are those who are weary of life; they are often saved from suicide through this preventive ministry. Their number is great. In Germany there are 50,000 attempts at suicide each year and 15,000 of them are successful. It has often been argued that really desperate persons never stop to pick up the telephone. But this is true only of a relatively small proportion. In their case their relatives, neighbours or friends often ring up in despair—"He is going to do away with himself” or “We have found a letter . . .” During the Hungarian revolt, a 17-year-old maid-servant rang up—“My employers are planning to commit suicide tonight—-

they say there will be another war.” Or a boy of 16 may telephone about his sister only a year his senior, “She is expecting a baby and is going out to drown herself.”

Often there are calls from persons who have attempted suicide but have not succeeded and afterwards regretted their action; they have cut their veins but are still conscious, or the rope has given way and the heavily Injured old man has dragged himself to the nearest telephone “During the two years In which it has been operating in Berlin," writes Dr. Klaus Thomas, “the telephone ministry has cared for about 1000 people who are weary of life or people in danger of committing suicide; 10 per cent, of them had actually attempted suicide. Their question, although it may be set in different words, invariably is—“ls there no other way out?” Highest Suicide Figure “Berlin has the highest suicide figure in the world. It is remarkable that the figure for West Berlin has dropped from six per 10,000 inhabitants in 1943 to three per 10,000 in 1957, while the figure for East Berlin is still six per 10,000.” In the care for the "tired of living” group the telephone has been a literal life saver—it has snatched desperate people from the grave. Even where suicide is not contemplated, the telephone ministry does something for needy folk that a more personal ministry could not do, for the simple reason that many who dial a number are estranged from the church, sometimes even anti-church. Obviously, there are limits to ■ ministry carried on across a wire, the person to person approach is not there, yet so much is done that it is equally obvious that here is a genuine ministry being carried on. Whether anything of the sort is needed in this country it would be hard to say unless an advertisement were inserted in a city newspaper and the need gauged by the response. The suicide rate in New Zealand is low, but there are many other callers, perhaps, who would avail themselves of a telephone ministry were such a service available.