World Suicide Prevention Day

Suicide prevention is commemorated around the world every September 10. The World Health Organization has led the promotion of this day so that countries incorporate mental health care of citizens in their agendas and thus, through comprehensive and multisectoral strategies, address a problem that claims about 800,000 lives a year.

We join this commemoration and ratify our commitment to the mental health of Colombia's ethnic, Afro-descendant and rural communities. From our point of view, we have always worked for the social development of the most vulnerable groups, that is why we conceive suicide prevention as a process in which self-realization, individual and collective growth must be strengthened; always hand in hand with the differential approach.

Within the actions carried out by our organization, in the line of Mental Health, Violence and Peace, we have carried out two projects that have allowed us to approach suicide prevention from the joint work between different actors (state institutions and communities, for example). One of these was the design of the National Plan for Prevention and Integral Attention to people with suicidal behaviors; in which we incorporated components of early detection of risk, diagnosis and management of the family and local context. This plan was adopted by the country's Ministry of Health and Social Protection.

The second was the construction of a Mental Health Care Model for indigenous ethnic groups. In this we worked under an intercultural approach in which sharing knowledge and respecting rights was the basis for any action taken. In this project we defined four main strategies for the prevention of indigenous suicide:

• Promotion of autonomy processes of the organizations of ethnic groups and peoples.

• Strengthening of the processes of construction of meaning and significance in the communities of indigenous ethnic groups and peoples.

• Generation of protective resources at the family level.

• Provision of timely mental health care for members of indigenous ethnic groups and peoples.

These recommendations are actions that are on the public health agenda of the country and that have been built to prevent suicide, but still need institutional support from the State and civil society. On this day we emphasize that it is possible to prevent suicide when working with respect for the beliefs and customs of the different peoples of Colombia and when it is made visible as a public health problem.