The Only Way Out : Analyzing The Native American Suicide Epidemic

Suicide is prevalent amongst Native American youth because of all the problems they may face. They face problems in many different ways and they think their only way out is to commit suicide. Based on the text, it states, “But lack of resources to treat mental health problems, substance abuse and family turmoil have an effect too, Wagner said. "There is this feeling of being trapped, and having nowhere to go"”(Newsela). This shows that the Native Americans have some problems that they think they can’t overcome. The reservations don’t have as many organizations to help and prevent suicide. Some Native Americans who go to school say that the teachers are being hard on them, but the teachers don’t know what is happening at home. They face problems at home with their family.

The continuous trauma that they endured has negatively affected the mental health and physical health of the population. Native Americans are at higher risk for depression, physical/sexual abuse, domestic violence, substance abuse, and mental health issues (McLeigh, 2010). Native American youth are three times more likely to commit suicide than the average population. Native Americans in general are twice as likely to be diagnosed with depression and five times more likely to have alcoholism. Colonization not damaged natives mentally, but also brought harm to their physical health as Europeans brought diseases (measles, chicken pox, smallpox, etc) to America (McLeigh, 2010). In order for this population to be served to treat their many medical and mental health issues brought on by years of trauma, policies must be implemented to help Native Americans specifically. However, the reality is that natives mental health needs are often ignored (Gone, 2004). There have been policies that have attempted to meet the needs, but much more is needed. In the most recent action towards improving mental health services for natives, the Affordable Care Act of 2010 permanently gave authorization to the Indian Health Care Improvement Act (Ross, Garfield, Brown, & Raghavan, 2015). This policy will be discussed and analyzed to examine further needs for services in this

The usual causes, triggers as well as risk factors that are associated with suicide are poverty, trauma, substance abuse and relationship problems (Ridani et al., 2015). From 2001 to 2010, 4.2% of Aboriginal deaths was due to suicide while for all other Australians it only accounted for 1.6% of deaths (ABS, 2012). Furthermore, females of Indigenous Australian origin aged 15 to 19 years, committed suicide 5.9 times more than other female Australians while the ratio for male Indigenous people was 5.5 more than other male Australians and the suicide overall ratio for Indigenous people is twice more than that of non-Indigenous Australians. (ABS, 2012) A person is at an increased risk for suicide if they have mental health disorders and chronic diseases, are unemployed, isolation, social support is non-existent, history of depression and other behavioural factors as well (Evans & Brown,

Suicide attempts are highest among American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) females, followed by AI/AN males, and are lowest among African American and White adolescent males. Due to shame and the value placed on not looking weak in the African American community, some youth use less taboo ways of ending their lives. Wolfgang (1959) stated that, “victim-precipitated suicide is disproportionately represented among African American males.” For example, “In studies of officer-involved shootings, there appears to be evidence of suicidal intent in between 10% and 46% of cases” (Klinger, 2001). Therefore, due to cultural beliefs within the African American community, sometimes African Americans use victim-precipitated suicide as a more conventional way of ending their lives. The American Indian/Alaska Native group has also been

Secondly, the federal government of Canada funding towards suicide prevention programs in Aboriginal communities helps stop youth suicide. First Nation youths are 5 to 6 times more likely to commit suicide compared to non-aboriginal youths (Kassam, 2017). A community-based suicide prevention program is a key to helping stop the aboriginal youth suicide crisis. For instance, another northern Ontario First Nation community, Wapekeka, was a leader in suicide prevention (Kassam, 2017). Wapekeka First Nation’s suicide prevention program was working until the federal government cut funding towards the program and the spokesperson for Wapekeka First Nation, Joshua Frogg said, “twenty-two years we ran it until it drove us into a deficit. We couldn’t do it anymore.” (Kassam, 2017).

Since December of 2015, there has been an alarming rate of suicides to occur in Manitoba, Canada on the Cross Lake First Nation Indian Reserve. Since then six students have committed suicide while ten others have attempted it. Most of the people who have attempted suicide are ninth and tenth graders of that school and are currently on a suicide prevention list. The chief of the small community of only six thousand eight hundred individuals is calling a state of emergency. Shirley Robinson who is the chief told CNN, “There's so much hurt, there's so much pain. You can feel it in every direction of our nation. Only last year there was one suicide while in some of the recent past years there had been no suicides. The community said it is difficult

The newly acquired ideas were implemented in various Native American programs to improve the mental/physical health of all Native Americans. Most programs, however, base their ongoing work on four key concepts. . (Beal et al 2005) They are analyzing how alcohol and drugs affect the immediate family unit as well as how it affects relatives and friends physically, emotionally, and spiritually. What, if any of these affects are being carried down from one generation to another. Does alcohol set off any of the other affects such as drug abuse, mental illness et al? Finally, coming to the carefully scrutinized observation that alcoholism often co-exists in Indian communities with certain definite other problems like depression, self-hate, cultural shame, and stress-related acting out or inappropriate misconduct. (NADC 2011)These four main ideas are still used today to further identify and improve mental health conditions among the Native Americans.

Aboriginal people represent less than 3% of the total population in BC. Yet, they account for more than 9% of all suicides in BC (Chandler). The numbers of suicides amongst aboriginal youth are even more alarming – nearly one-fourth of all youth suicides in BC are committed by aboriginals and more than half of all aboriginal suicides are committed by youth (Chandler). The fact that indigenous communities in Canada have the highest rate of suicide of any culturally identifiable group in the world implies that these alarming statistics may not solely be a result of aboriginal communities belonging to a minority cultural group. I will attempt to build a speculative hypothesis behind the significantly high suicide rates amongst aboriginal

Native Americans have the highest suicide and depression rate. Like Little Tree, Junior, and the NPR Navajo are three Indian’s and a tribe. All of these Indians had to deal with the white men judging and being racist towards them. Like in the book Little Tree when him and his grandfather were walking back home, and a car stopped them and asked for directions she called them foreigners, because grandpa was trying to be polite and the girl did not realize it. Another huge problem that these Native Americans relied on the Government, but the Government did not support them any kind of way. They took over their land and forced them to live on reservations. Besides Little Tree he lived in the mountains. But even though he lived in the mountains his grandparents and him still have’d to deal with the Government.

Native Americans have a staggering forty percent rate from suicidal incidents in the ages fifteen through twenty-four. For young adults, it occurs between eighteen and twenty-four. Surprisingly, Native Americans have the highest rate of suicide than the general population, ethnicities, and races. In the year 2014, a report found that suicide happened to be the second leading cause of death, other than unintentional injuries. It is believed that in many occasions, Native Americans do not like to speak about suicide. In the case it was brought up, they will eventually kill themselves. They Native American culture struggles to receive mental-health funding to save anyone they can. Health issues like Diabetes and depression are very common.

Historical trauma has had an impact on the mental health of members of Native Americans/First Nations communities. There is a prevalence of suicide, substance abuse, and depression, and the internalization of oppressive beliefs about their own community (Grayshield, et al., 2013). As a result, there is a mistrust of the majority culture (Sue and Sue, 2013). In turn, a Native Americans/First Nations client may unwillingly choose to open up about personal problems to a counselor in the

This has resulted in high rates of alcoholism and substance abuse among First Nations people. Statistics have also shown that aboriginal people in Canada have higher mortality rates, higher rates of disease, higher rates of accidental deaths and much higher rates of suicide than the rest of the Canadian population. In Canada, suicide and self-inflicted injury is the number one cause of death among natives aged 10 to 44. Additionally, native women attempt suicide eight times more often than other Canadian women, and native men attempt suicide five times more often than other Canadian

Cowboys and Indians. Cowboys and Indians. Here we're getting all our people killed, and that's the kind of stuff they showed us.” It is almost as if they were mocking the very children that they treated so cruelly. Where is these people’s conscience? Only until the American Indian Movement took place were the Natives allowed to participate in cultural practices. There are still a number of boarding school open to this day that are trying to reeducate Native American’s about their culture. Many of these boarding school are a retreat for the students that are trying to escape the peer pressure and poverty that is found on their reservation. Natives are still haunted to this day because of everything their culture has had to endure. There is still a vast amount of heartbreak. Many Natives turn to substances such as drugs and alcohol to cope and many also turn to suicide, being the population with the highest suicide rate. (Longenecker, 2008) While the schools are a great alternative to their home on the reservation they are struggling to stay open because federal funding has been cut. In the past few decades, tribes have begun taking over boarding

Americans to their own death. 82% of American Indians on reservation commit suicide. Without proper housing or home care,

While discovering theories and research by sociologist Emile Durkheim, I was able to see a clear connection to how these theories could be applied to the amount of suicides to those of first nation decent. Considering citizens from first nations groups have been estimated to be eleven times more likely to commit suicide, there are underlying factors of why this may be. Durkheim’s theory states that suicide is a sociological issue and as we have seen there are many ways society could affect ones emotional state.