September is suicide awareness month. The issue is one I hold dear. I, like many in Maine, have been touched by the tragedy on more occasions than I can believe.
Our suicide rate is above the national average, and it was the highest in New England in 2012. The rate among middle-aged adults has increased dramatically in recent years. Endeavors to increase awareness are growing more plentiful, an important step toward progress, though programs and resources made available to those who most need them remain limited and politically under attack.
In 2013, Gov. Paul LePage signed into law a bill designed to bring suicide awareness efforts to elementary and high schools throughout the state. Rep. Paul Gilbert, D-Jay, the bill’s primary sponsor, told the Bangor Daily News that it was the most important piece of legislation he had sponsored to date. The impressive bill passed with unanimous support and called for suicide prevention awareness education programs at all schools. It also made suicide prevention training mandatory for all school personnel. This move to increase awareness is an important one.
Every September, the Blaine House co-hosts another event to generate awareness — an event with the Maine Suicide Prevention Program at which local suicide awareness efforts are highlighted and the administration’s verbal commitment to suicide prevention is reiterated. Last year’s event highlighted several examples of exemplary responses and behavior on the part of law enforcement throughout the state.
I was the guest of Kyle Poissonnier at this event. His clothing company, Katalyst, diverts September sales of one of its products to state prevention efforts and works to bring attention to the issue. Last year, his endeavor proved so successful that he has launched similar efforts in five new states.
Efforts to increase awareness locally and statewide are incredibly important, but they are not enough to illustrate a sense of seriousness about another pressing public health issue. Exclusive focus on awareness and law enforcement without investment in systems of support and medical intervention leaves our statewide response to suicide anemic.
Nevermind that LePage last November made a joke about his re-election driving a critic to suicide, the LePage administration’s approach to making mental health resources available, particularly to poor and underserved communities, underscores a commitment in rhetoric only.
I recently spoke with Steven Mazza, a formerly drug-addicted Portlander who has spent the past four years clean and sober. At the end of his rope and frustrated by his addiction, he tried to end his life in 2010.
He said Portland, by way of the programs that were available to him during his period of recovery — both public assistance and help specific to his recovery — saved his life.
“A big part of that was the assistance that the city used to provide,” Mazza said. “And it is so scary to see those programs and that help disappearing.”
Under LePage earlier this year, Maine Department of Health and Human Services proposed $45 million in cuts to reimbursement for medication management and outpatient mental health services.
“We’re going to have a huge crisis on our hands,” Simonne Maline, executive director of the Consumer Council System of Maine, told the Kennebec Journal. Kennebec County Sheriff Randall Liberty called it “an archaic approach to mental health.”
And in so many cases, what is suicide but a mental health issue?
Further, those struggling with addiction are at six times greater risk of suicide, and the LePage administration has recently doubled down on its obtuse approach to addressing addiction — not by making relevant programs that help people more widely available but by focusing narrowly on law enforcement.
Seeing how contemptibly the administration attacks the programs that serve as some of the only resources available to those at risk of taking their own lives, it strikes me as retrospectively surprising that LePage didn’t try to veto the 2013 youth awareness endeavor.
While LePage has expressed concern about the issue, beyond signing a unanimously supported bill, his administration has done little to illustrate a serious commitment to investing in solutions. By constantly attacking resources made available to those struggling with addiction and mental health issues, and by myopically focusing on substance abuse addiction as a law enforcement issue, the administration’s lip service means little as suicide continues to take a heavy toll.
Alex Steed has written about and engaged in politics since he was a teenager. He’s an owner-partner of a Portland-based content production company and lives with his family, dogs and garden in Cornish.
