Self-destruction is never a proper solution to life’s intricate problems. For many people, the feeling of hopelessness, personal failure, intolerable pressures, and life circumstances, ultimately lead to self-destructive behaviour. Empirical research and demographic data clearly show that a significant proportion of people who commit suicide are young people, aged 13 to 25. The early loss of a young person at the age when they are at their most productive can be a deeply troubling tragedy for the family, the community and the country.
People do not make a decision to die without previous tension or without taking their time. Rather, self-harm is generally the result of a long history of emotional distress, deep depression, chronic rejection, unmet rage and subtle changes in behavior over time. If these subconscious signals are not recognised by family, friends, or those around them, they intensify and lead to a fatalistic despair. The initial action to prevent this slow psychological decay from reaching an irreversible point is to recognise early warning signs and offer compassionate emotional support and active interpersonal communication.
In Bangladesh, the law-making process of mental healthcare was substantially modernised by replacing the outdated and colonial-era Lunacy Act of 1912 with the Mental Health Act of 2018. The revised law makes mental health care a fundamental health right and specifies the statutory rules on psychiatric treatment, consent of the patient and the supervision of institutions. There are still large gaps in the statute in relation to the decriminalisation of attempted self-harm (Section 309 of the Penal Code). In order to provide a pathway for distressed persons to get medical attention instead of punitive legal proceedings, the attempted act of self-harm should be decriminalised.
Intense academic pressure, competitive economic environment and widespread employment insecurity play a significant role in youth self-harm. Moreover, the fast-growing urbanisation, inflation and low employment opportunities generate severe financial worries among youth. Online idealisation of ‘Others’ leads to low self-esteem, social isolation and feelings of inadequacy among adolescents. Furthermore, unchecked cyberbullying, digital harassment and public shaming of young people on the internet have a devastating impact on their wellbeing. The digital world often exacerbates the psychological vulnerabilities of distressed youth, and can make it difficult for them to access support in the ‘real world’ when problems arise, and to get access to professional help for mental health issues, without sufficient digital literacy, parental guidance and enforced cyber-safety policies.
Bangladesh has significant structural weaknesses in mental health care with a severe lack of qualified psychiatrists, clinical psychologists and trained psychiatric nurses. Most specialised mental health facilities and professional counsellors are in large metropolitan cities, with a high number of people in the rural and suburban areas not being able to access psychiatric services. In addition, public health expenditure is very low in mental health care. Policy measures that are essential in closing this rural-urban healthcare gap include increasing the number of decentralised counseling centres, embedding mental health services into primary healthcare clinics and providing subsidies for psychiatric treatment.
Schools, colleges and universities play an important role in identifying and reducing mental distress among young people. This shift moves from simple academic teaching to creating dedicated, confidential student counselling units with qualified professionals in educational institutions. Incorporating mental health lessons into the regular school curriculum helps to normalise psychological suffering and provides students with healthy coping strategies. In addition, teachers and academic staff should identify early behavioural shifts, chronic absenteeism and social withdrawal will help to identify and intervene on time early before the emotional distress turns into a serious crisis.
Families have a strong influence in either exacerbating or alleviating youth psychological distress. Adolescents’ psychological resilience is severely affected by high domestic conflict, unrealistic parental expectations, broken family structures and emotional neglect. On the other hand, factors that can help prevent despair are open intra-family communication, emotional validation and supportive domestic environments. Having non-judgmental areas at home where young family members can express their fears, public displays of inadequacy, emotional issues without fear of negative responses and criticism, will help create good emotional security at home.
It is imperative that there be crisis intervention services established in each area that are available at all times, and that there be national hotlines for suicide prevention. Helplines with trained crisis counselors are available and provide immediate psychological support and de-escalation for people who are experiencing an acute psychological crisis, with the helplines being confidential and toll-free. These crisis services should be made as widely known as possible in educational settings, online and in the media to maximise effectiveness. By connecting to emergency hotlines and providing immediate medical response, it ensures that people in life-threatening situations can get immediate and professional help at the cite of the incident.
The writer is an LL.B. Student, Department of Law, World University of Bangladesh
