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Just one month after it was launched, the 024 hotline answered nearly 15,000 calls and identified 290 suicides, according to the Ministry of Health. However, four years before the creation of this official hotline for suicidal behavior, there was already a prelude entirely voluntarily.

The psychologist Junibel Lancho (Madrid, November 27, 1958) devised the first telephone against suicide for Spain together with the Barandilla Association. Altruistically and hand in hand with a group of psychologists and affected relatives. "Without help from the State, Autonomous Communities, or municipalities. With hardly any visibility of the media," he says, because they were told that the suicide could not be reported.

The Madrid psychologist Junibel Lancho, promoter of the first telephone against suicide for Spain.

"We wanted to help people in our free time and we attended 8,500 requests with suicidal ideation, some in progress, and family members so that they had tools to know how to act," says the clinical director of the Lajma day hospital, where middle-aged people with severe mental disorder are treated.

Now that the prevailing taboos are beginning to be broken, the promoter of the service relates in the book I can not with so much painr (Ed. The sphere of books) how alarm signals should be understood. "We can say, without a doubt, that talking about suicide saves lives." That is why it includes real testimonies that were not completed and proposes concrete actions. "Suicide is preventable."

According to the WHO, about 700,000 people commit suicide each year. Every 40 seconds, a person dies by suicide in the world, says the WHO. In young people between 15 and 29 years old, it is the fourth cause of unnatural death and exceeds the numbers of victims of traffic accidents and those produced by interpersonal violence. Why is such a serious problem silenced? It has always been a taboo subject in society. There has been a lot of stigma about mental health. Also because in Spain we are of Christian religious confession and before the person who committed suicide could not be buried in holy field. It's something that's ingrained in the culture. But we are all responsible for someone committing suicide. That person lives in a family, in a community, goes to school or to a work environment... However, nothing is done in society for prevention. The argument of the contagion effect of suicide when reporting could also be applied to terrorism or gender-based violence. If, in view of the statistics, the strategy of not talking about it has not worked, are the media on a better track today making it visible? I still remember how from the Barandilla Association we called all the media to cover a September 10, on the occasion of World Day for the Prevention of Suicide, the launch of the first phone and they told us that they could not count it. In 2023, we are called to bring to light real testimonies that have not been consolidated to help other people. They do it without staying in the news that someone has committed suicide and period, but to express that there are solutions and that this temporary problem can be overcome. We cannot say that we are going to stay in a zero suicide, but if we had action plans or campaigns, as in traffic accidents, people would know more about the subject and pay attention to the signs.
In his book he approaches the mental health problems that threaten children and adolescents, such as the inappropriate use of new technologies, addictions, comparisons in social networks ... What can families do? You have to start from the bottom, from childhood. If parents create a secure attachment, good bonds, when those children reach adolescence they will not have to communicate exclusively from the non-reality of social networks, as is the case now. What happens is that a kid of 14, 15 or 16 years can not be told at 12 o'clock at night that you take away his mobile because there are dramas and we have seen it on the phone. The boundaries should be set first, as well as that companionship and tenderness so they know you're there to help. Parental affection is critical in mental health issues. Without doing a third grade, it's important to take time for teens to tell them how they're feeling. What happened from that first phone if suicidal ideation stopped? What help did that person have next? We were lame. After a call of an hour or an hour and a half, we managed to stop the crisis, we sent him to psychotherapy and they replied: "I do not have money to pay for a continuous psychologist." If you referred him to Social Security there was a three-month waiting list in which they see a patient every six months for about 15 minutes. There have to be resources to treat people because underneath every suicidal crisis there is always depression. No one gets up in the morning happy and commits suicide. Not enough Prevention And that is why, now that 024 is already institutionalized, we have created a new area of face-to-face and online therapies without waiting lists. When a person is in depressive disorder, do you have to tell them to go out and socialize, to do yoga or sports and all those tools that can serve to distract themselves and feel better? Not at first. It is a time when the person is not prepared. If the psychotherapeutic process has begun, you have to wait a while for the medication to take effect. Helping herself with the people around her, her friends and family, she will feel more accompanied. You have to go to the room, ask him how he is, offer him to listen. Relating and not isolating yourself is positive to get out of that loop of hopelessness. Alone you will not be able to, you need family and a professional. In the event that a suicide attempt has occurred, should pressure be exerted for the person to be treated? If the person has ended up in the hospital service after trying to rush or have taken something, at most they will be there between 24 and 48 hours. After that time, you need resources. Don't make him feel guilty or a burden. When a person comes to do something like that, he has a lot of suffering and pain. He doesn't know what else to do anymore. He is shouting for help. Sometimes on the suicide phone we have been told that no one else knew. If those around you offer help, you're sure to feel less alone. Should we be concerned about the dehumanization that comes hand in hand with great advances such as artificial intelligence? I, personally, am upset by this news although it plays a very important role in society, as with social networks, it depends on how it is used. We must apply artificial intelligence without neglecting people. The rush, immediacy and individuality are depriving us of stopping for a while to ask ourselves how we are, have a coffee or be in contact with nature. This has to change. We cannot ignore the terrain of compassion, of listening to the other and to ourselves. That time is paramount to a full life. Do mental health professionals have reliable evidence about the effects of the pandemic? In girls, anorexia has increased by 200%. In child psychiatry, consultations have doubled. These are just two examples in data. But I do not like to stay in reliable statistics, which there are many, but in the people or little people behind the data. We have studies that talk about children who are sadder and with worse habits. Is there a way to reverse it? The pandemic has caught us all off guard. The kids have been removed from their environment, from their extracurricular activities... And they have suffered at a stage where they are forming. Parents have also had a hard time and now it is taking its toll if they have not known how to deal with what has come upon them. We have medicalized people's lives, antidepressants are already being given to children right away. Perhaps it is a normal stage of sadness if their parents have transmitted that anxiety because they have lost a loved one or work in this adversity. But we have to communicate with them to make them understand that throughout history there has been crisis and it comes out. Let's not stay in the "poor children of now". Being sad is not synonymous with mental disorder. To get ahead, you have to give hope. QWhat is missing from the administration to improve in this regard? We need a national suicide prevention law so that we all have joint action plans and not that each Autonomous Community goes its own way. The security forces and bodies: national and local police, firefighters, Civil Guard... We should all be at one when something like this happens. We need more psychologists and psychiatrists in schools and hospitals. In public health we are between six and seven on average and in the European Union between 12 and 14, which is also little. In short, provide more personnel and economic resources. Leisure groups can also be encouraged so that it is not all to have a mobile phone next to you. Camps and extracurricular activities are an excellent prevention tool.

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