N.L. suicide numbers up 25% in 2021, more than doubled in Labrador-Grenfell

WARNING: This story contains a discussion of suicide.

Suicide deaths have risen across Newfoundland and Labrador, increasing by 25 per cent from 2020 to 2021, according to numbers from the province's chief medical examiner.

The suicide rate in the Labrador-Grenfell Health region, meanwhile, more than doubled in the same time period, with 19 people dying by suicide in the region in 2021, compared with nine in 2020.

While Labrador-Grenfell also spans Newfoundland's Northern Peninsula, suicide affects First Nations and Inuit communities, of which many call Labrador home, at a higher rate.

It's something Natan Obed, the president of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, knows all about.

At an announcement for federal Inuit suicide prevention funding in Ottawa on Thursday, Obed addressed the impact of suicide on Inuit communities.

"We have an ongoing challenge of suicide and suicidal ideation in our communities. We know that we need to do more, especially for young Inuit, who are most at risk of suicide," he said.

"Every last Inuk across this country has a connection with suicide. We all have lost family members and friends, important people in our community."

While the Eastern Health region also saw an increase, the Central and Western Health regions both saw decreases from 2020.

Provincially, the combined number of suicides jumped 25 per cent, from 65 in 2020 to 81 in 2021, ending a downward trend that started in 2018.

Nationally, about 4,000 people take their own lives every year, according to the Canadian Mental Health Association.

Tina Davies of Logy Bay is one of those who knows what it is like to lose a loved one to suicide.

After Davies's son Richard died in 1995, she started a suicide loss support group and a foundation in his honour.

"I don't lie to anybody. It does not go away," said Davies.

"There's nothing worse than losing a child to suicide. The only thing that I take out of that is that that's the worst thing that's ever gonna happen to me, ever, in my entire life."

But Davies says she isn't concerned by the 2021 increase.

"The thing about suicide and the number of suicide deaths is that it does vary from year to year. It goes up and down," she said.

"Twenty-five per cent isn't out of the ordinary.… I don't think there's an outbreak of a suicide pandemic."

One researcher agrees with her.

Nathaniel Pollock, an adjunct professor at the Labrador campus of Memorial University, has been researching suicide rates as well as suicidal thoughts across the country over time. He stressed that researchers expect slight changes in suicide rates from one year to another.

But, says Pollock, due to their timeliness, annual changes are helpful in alerting experts to regions in crisis that might need immediate action to prevent further suicides.

Pollock says when an area sees a stark increase in the suicides, it might have to do with the so-called "clustering effect," which occurs when people are so affected by the loss of someone close to them that they decide to end their own lives too.

"We sort of think about suicide becoming contagious in a way, in a social way," said Pollock, adding that the phenomenon could be observed in Labrador West in 2016 and on the Burin Peninsula in 2017.

This effect, says Pollock, can sometimes skew the provincial suicide rate.

"You see these spikes in the numbers. And in some instances that's not part of a general trend in the province overall but that's really specific to a place," he said.

To explain why suicide rates have changed on a provincial level, says Pollock, longitudinal data is more important.

"That's what we want to be using to make larger-scale decisions about what programs we fund and how we allocate resources and the kinds of policies and strategies that we use," said Pollock.

Still, Progressive Conservative health critic Paul Dinn called both the overall development and the increase in Labrador-Grenfell "very troubling."

He points to long wait times for long-term mental health support and a lack of continuity of care, which he believes are crucial factors in suicide rates.

"When you go to get looked at for a mental health crisis and you're sent away, probably with a brochure or an online website to go to or, 'Give us a call whenever,' that doesn't go over," said Dinn.

"Until we start realizing that and start coming up with some real long-term solutions for people, we're going to unfortunately continue to see these trends."

Health Minister Tom Osborne agreed that the increases are "disappointing."

Still, he said, Towards Recovery, the provincial government's five-year plan to improve provincial mental health care implemented in 2017, is working.

"Wait times for mental health services have been improved significantly in the province. Bridge the gApp has been very successful and adopted throughout the country," said Osborne, referring to an online mental health resource developed in 2015.

"We now need to work on getting the numbers reduced again."

To aid that, the provincial government launched Our Path of Resilience in June, a five-year suicide prevention plan including 12 action items, such as workplace training, the expansion of mobile crisis response teams or support for those who lost someone to suicide.

Both Osborne and Dinn agree the 2021 numbers are the result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Pollock, however, cautions there may not be such a strong connection between the two.

"I think COVID is part of the picture. But at an individual level … that's a real simplification," said Pollock.

Research, says Pollock, indicates that suicides even slightly decreased in 2020 and 2021 nationally compared with pre-pandemic years, while some recent surveys have shown an increase in suicidal thoughts within the last year compared with 2019.

"It's really a mixed picture and there's not a simple sort of relationship between the pandemic and things like suicidality," he said.

Beyond the numbers, they all agree, it's important to understand that every suicide means the loss of an individual person.

"One suicide is one too many," said Dinn. "It's an act of desperation — ultimate act of desperation."

Where to get help if you or someone you know is struggling:

Talk Suicide Canada: 1-833-456-4566 (phone) | 45645 (Text, 4 p.m. to midnight ET only)

Kids Help Phone: 1-800-668-6868 (phone), live chat counselling at www.kidshelpphone.ca

Canadian Association for Suicide Prevention: Find a 24-hour crisis centre

Hope for Wellness Helpline: 1-855-242-3310 (phone, available in Cree, Ojibway and Inuktitut upon request)

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