The Head of Therapy and Wellness Department at the 37 Military Hospital, Dr Erica D.
Dickson, has described the suicide deaths among police officers in the country as an issue of concern.Quoting a study conducted between 2015 and 2021, she said 69 police officers lost their lives through suicide during that period.In another study that was recently undertaken which sampled 268 police officers, she said 28 percent of them had a lifetime suicide ideation; three percent were planning to have suicide at the time; those threatening suicide were 21.6 percent, while those who had a 12-month suicide ideation were 26.9 percent.World Suicide Prevention DayDr Dickson, who made this known at the 2024 World Suicide Prevention Day Forum in Accra last Tuesday, however, pointed out that the statistics did not mean the police service was the only security service in the country that might have personnel who committed suicide, adding that the other security services might be experiencing a similar trend but because some of them were tight-knit, it might be difficult to find statistics to back it up.Despite that, she said some media reportage on suicide had been mentioned among people in the Ghana Armed Forces (GAF).She pointed out that personnel of the security services, by the nature of their work, were often exposed to potentially traumatic situations and emergencies such as lost of lives, floods, fires and road accidents, and that added to society's expectation of them to remain tough and resilient at all times, exposing them to psychological trauma and increasing the risk of mental health difficulties, including ending their lives by suicide."Just being in the service increases your rate of being suicidal.
People in the service may develop all kinds of mental disorders ranging from acute stress disorders to anxieties to some serious adjustment problems and maladaptations to post traumatic stress disorder. They may actually have triggers of severe mental disorders," she said.She said as service personnel, they were well placed to engage many people but also at risk of poor mental disorders and suicide risk.Paradigm change She called for a change in the Ghanaian paradigm of mental health and suicide, as well as putting in place proactive measures such as advocacy, support services, community engagement to reduce stigma, beside treating with compassion and dignity, as well as prioritising mental health to expedite a change in the narrative. She said changing the narrative called for mental health and suicide literacy across ranks; break the cultural and religious biases around suicide and a policy development supporting mental health and suicide prevention for service persons.
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