SOS: More and more people are threatening to kill themselves

The SOS Alarm figures show a marked increase compared to last year in calls categorized as “suicide threat”.Image: Ingela Landström / TT

There has been great concern that the pandemic will lead to an increase in mental illness in Sweden, and the SOS Alarm figures now show a marked increase compared to last year of calls categorized as “suicide threats”.

During the May-August period, those calls were up 13.4 percent compared to last year, and in May alone the difference was more than 18 percent compared to 2019.

Conversations that end in the “suicide threat” category are those in which there is an explicit threat that the person will kill himself, but therefore do not say anything about the number of suicides.

– It can be the person himself or someone else calling. It could be that the person is standing by the railroad tracks, or is on their way there, or threatening with a weapon or medicine, for example, says SOS operator Rebecka Moen.

Rebecka Moen does not perceive that it is the coronavirus itself that has mainly caused the increase in suicide threats, but the social impact that resulted from the restrictions of the authorities.

– Several conversations I have had have been about the person who may have gotten rid of the only contact he had. Where it can be anything from the fact that the main residence support has not been able to visit, to canceled meetings and meetings, or that the person himself has had common symptoms of illness and has not been able to contact support people as usual.

She emphasizes that they can’t know for sure, but says she and her colleagues have experienced that many of those who called with suicide threats are relatively young.

– The experience is that there are many young adults, and even then with a history of mental illness, who now feel even worse, says Rebecka Moen.

But even though the increase has been particularly marked and concerning during the crown spring, it is difficult to see it as a temporary problem.

– Although we have more conversations now, we had many conversations about this past year without an ongoing pandemic. We have struggled with mental illness for a long time, says Rebecka Moen.