Youth Suicide Proposal

In the United States, suicide is the third-leading cause of death for 10 to 14-year-olds (CDC, 2015) and for 15 to 19-year-olds (Friedman, 2008). In 2013, 17.0% of students grades 9 to 12 in the United States seriously thought about committing suicide; 13.6% made a suicide plan; 8.0% attempted suicide; and 2.7% attempted suicide in which required medical attention (CDC, 2015). These alarming statistics show that there is something wrong with the way suicide is handled in today’s society. In order to alleviate the devastating consequences of teenage suicide, it is important to get at the root of what causes it all: mental illness. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Protection (2013), mental illness is the imbalance of thinking, state of mind, and mood. Approximately 90% of all suicides are committed by people with mental illnesses (NAMI, n.d.). This shows that there is a correlation between mental illness and suicide. If mental illnesses are not treated, deadly consequences could occur. It would make sense that if there is a correlation between mental illness and suicide across all ages, the same should be thought for adolescents. Approximately 21% of all teenagers have a treatable mental illness (Friedman, 2008), although 60% do not receive the help that they need (Horowitz, Ballard, & Pao, 2009). If mental illnesses are not found and treated in teenagers, some of them may pay the ultimate price.

Suicide has been rising at alarming rates; the overall suicide rate for children and adolescents has increased over 300% since the 1950s. (Miller, 2009) Adolescent children are screaming out for our help, are we just ignoring the signs or do we not care? For young people, an average 1,800 take their own lives and 85,000 are hospitalized for attempts nationally (CDC, 2008). With this kind of statistics we need to step in and take some action.

The rate of suicide, the act or an instance of taking one's own life voluntarily and intentionally, increases each year. “More adolescents die each year from suicide than from cancer, heart disease, AIDS, birth defects, stroke, pneumonia, influenza, and chronic lung disease, combined” (Preventing Teen Suicide, 2016, p.2). These facts show suicide is a serious problem among teens. Last year, teen suicide became the second leading cause of death in the United States confirming the significant increase in teen suicides.

Polytech High School has experienced four deaths among students all within one month in the year of 2012. The most recent death was a 17-year-old male on February 15, 2012. This increase in suicides among this particular age group has generated many questions both from the community as well as researchers. According to WBOC, The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has stepped in to get a better understanding of why there has been increase of suicides and why the increase in this particular age group. A common factor among all four fatal cases were that all four individuals suffered from depression, with strong implications that the depression may have went unaddressed and untreated (Crosby et al., 2013).

The United States takes the eleventh spot in the top fifteen causes of death because of suicide. For our youth suicide is the third leading cause of death. In today’s society suicide in our youth is becoming a huge issue. Recently, youth suicide in Delaware has been a concerning topic. With the many suicides that have been taking place; we ask ourselves why is this happening to Delaware’s youth? It’s quite sad reading of all the lives taken at such young ages. It’s still questionable on the real reasons why so much of our youth want to cut their life short. There are numbers of things on why possibly our youth would want to commit suicide. There is one reason that has been proven to be the head cause and that is mental illness. A mental illness refers to a wide range of mental health conditions and disorders that affect your mood, thinking and behavior. Examples of mental illness includes depression, anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, eating disorders and addictive behaviors. (Staff, 2012) Some other causes may be bullying, drug and alcohol abuse and physical and sexual abuse. Youth that die by suicide believes that suicide is the only option at that moment; however Delaware has several resources available to prevent youth suicide.

There is at least 113 suicides each day or 1 every 13 minutes. Suicide among males is the seventh leading cause of death and the fourteenth leading cause in females. Most suicides are with a firearm and are carried out with a “ Saturday night special”. (Dilaura,Cynthia DiLaura) “More than 90 percent of suicide attempts with a gun are fatal. “ (Brady Campaign) There are a number of reasons why suicide occurs. Stress is the number one cause among our youth, bullies, peer pressure, depression, and abuse. 41,100 people committed suicide in the United States in 2013. Our young teens today does not take time to look deeper into there problem and to seek out a better solution. They are looking for a quick fix but not realizing once the trigger is pulled the result is final with no turning back. Most people who has attempted suicide is more likely to try a second attempt and most have an underlying mental illness. There is many warming that someone may be in a suicide crisis. We most learn how to see things through their eyes. No matter what one is facing in life or the difficult that lie ahead of them Nothing is worth taken your own

First, a study shows that one out of four students knows of a peer who has committed suicide by age seventeen (“Teen Suicide: Prevention Is Contagious, Too”). Also, a survey from the CDC National Risk Behavior said that 16% of American high schoolers admit that they have considered suicide in the last year (“Teen Suicide: Prevention Is Contagious, Too”). Next, suicide rates have tripled in the last thirty-five years (“Teen Suicide: A Preventable Tragedy”). Self-harm is also the largest cause of death in those ages fifteen-nineteen ( “Sad Teenage Girls are Becoming More So”). Some believe that teenage suicide rates have increased because more teens are using drugs and alcohol (“Teen Suicide: Prevention Is Contagious, Too”).

Boys are more likely than girls to die from suicide; however, girls are more likely to report attempting suicide with 81% of the suicide deaths in the 10 to 24 age group identified as males and 19% were females (“Suicide Among Youth,” 2013, para. 4). Therefore, addressing suicide prevention during a time that children are more acceptable to learning is ideal. Youth spend a significant amount of time in school; accordingly, schools should provide extensive training and information to the students in regards to suicide prevention. Unfortunately, individuals that die by suicide are not a certain age, a certain race, or part of a particular economic status. Thoughts of suicide can enter a person’s mind at any time which is why it is important to start suicide prevention education before the onset of situational factors that have the potential of developing suicidal thought. Schools are a naturally important place for students to receive

Suicide is a devastating, preventable tragedy and is among the top causes of death in the adolescent population. Compelling statistics given since 2009 show the number of

Each year, thousands of teens commit suicide in the United States. Suicide is a major problem as it is one of the leading causes of death among teenagers and young adults. Families and friends are heart-broken and greatly affected emotionally by the death of their loved one. It is unimaginable how hard it is for the parents and how they are going to cope with this most unfortunate tragedy. No parent ever imagine that this would happen to their child. Everyone, especially the parents, are often bewildered about the reason of their son/daughter for committing suicide. There are numerous possible reasons why teens commit suicide.

Each day, 95 people in the United States die by suicide. No one is immune to this tragic act regardless of age, race, ethnicity, gender, geographic location, and socioeconomic status. Suicide is especially prevalent in the adolescent and young adult populations, and is the third leading cause of death among individuals between the ages of 10 and 24 (Borges et al., 2010). Within the group of 10- to 14 year-olds, most deaths by suicide occur in children and adolescents ages 12-14, with the rate of suicide deaths increasing dramatically in the late teen years. The rate of suicidal behavior continues to increase until the early twenties, at which points it drops off until late

Teen suicide is a major problem in our society today. The adolescent suicide rate has tripled since 1960, while being the largest cause of death between the ages of 15 and 24. This is the one single age group that has seen an increase in suicides over the past thirty years. There are about 10,000 reported suicides reported annually. It is estimated however, that the true number of teen suicides is actually three to four times that number when unreported deaths are factored in.

“Following a decline of more than 28 percent, the suicide rate for 10- to-24-year-olds increased by 8 percent, the largest single-year rise in 15 years, according to a report just released in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's, CDC, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, MMWR” (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). This clearly shows that teen suicide is on the rise. “Data shows that between 2007 and 2015, there’s substantial increases in suicide rates for both young males and females,” said Tom Simon, an author of the report and associate director for science in the division of violence protection at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention”, “for young males, there was a 31% increase in suicide rates, and for young females, the suicide rate doubled”.

Depression, anxiety, and suicide are serious problems in high schools across the nation. Unfortunately, people and the news do not pay as much attention to teen suicide in comparison to large mass child mortalities such as school shootings. The rate of teenage suicide has tripled in the past three years; each week twenty-eight teens kill themselves in America. Nearly one in seven teens have said they have had suicidal thoughts or tendencies and one in fourteen admit to actually attempting suicide.

Suicide has been listed as the third leading cause of death in individuals of ages 15-24 years, according to the (Center of Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2008). Suicide by definition is the act of intentionally taking one’s own life by the use of drugs or lethal methods. Firearms are the most common method of suicide across all ages. Suicide and Suicidal attempts have been growing at an alarming rate (Diekstra & Garnefski, 1995) and theses activities are commonly found within individuals undergoing the adolescence phase. In the United States, the death rate of suicide is 7.32 and 12.58 per 100,000 in adolescents and young adults respectively (CDC, 2009). This is said to be a consistent trend with international averages (Heuveline, 2002).