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<\/div>\n?A new report by the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and United Suicide Survivors International showed that employers don’t want to talk about suicide. But the workplace may be the best place to reach the demographic most at risk: middle-aged men.<\/p>\n
Suicide is a leading cause of death among working-age adults in the U.S. Eighty percent of all deaths by suicide in the U.S. are among men and women ages 45 to 54, according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Men in this age group are more likely than women to die by suicide.<\/p>\n
“Most of these men have never had any contact with mental health services,” said Dr. Sally Spencer-Thomas, lead author of the report, who co-founded United Suicide Survivors International. “The workplace, thus, is the most cross-cutting system we have to intervene.”<\/p>\n
However, few companies are providing education on matters related to suicide. According to the white paper<\/a>, businesses avoid talking about suicide due to concerns that include the following:<\/p>\n The report referred to a survey of 1,200 managers in the construction industry who rated their fears regarding suicide prevention in the workplace. Among the respondents:<\/p>\n Study co-author Jodi Frey, a professor with School of Social Work at the University of Maryland, said many organizations fear saying something that could lead to a lawsuit or cause harm to an individual. They are sometimes even afraid to say the word “suicide” out of concern that saying it might cause someone to attempt suicide.<\/p>\n “This, by the way, is a myth,” Frey said. “In fact, talking about suicide and bringing up topics about mental health, well-being, substance use and, yes, suicide lets a person, or in this case the employee, know that you are a trusted person that they can reach out to when they might need support or a referral for counseling.”<\/p>\n The Role of Employers<\/p>\n For many years, workplaces believed that employees were dispensable, Spencer-Thomas said. As a result, they didn’t see a need to invest in the well-being of workers.<\/p>\n “Today, with the undisputable labor shortage, this culture is shifting,” she said. “Employers are waking up to the fact that they will not be able to recruit and retain talent unless they value the holistic well-being of their workforce.”<\/p>\n In the National Guidelines for Workplace Suicide Prevention, Spencer-Thomas’ team outlined nine practices to help organizations develop comprehensive and sustained strategies for mental health promotion and suicide prevention:<\/p>\n “Suicide prevention is not only the right thing to do, but it also impacts an employer’s bottom line,” Frey said. “As employers take steps to make the workplace a more supportive environment, they will find that employees enjoy working for them more\u2014they engage, they produce, they stay with their companies, and they live.”<\/p>\n\n
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