Australia is to hold a wide-ranging inquiry into suicides among military veterans and would appoint a permanent commissioner to try to curb the death rate, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said yesterday.
Australia, which has more than 3,000 soldiers deployed around the world, joins the US, Britain and Canada in exploring ways to prevent suicide among serving and former military personnel.
UNDER PRESSURE
Some 419 Australian defense personnel have died from suicide since 2001, which is 18 percent higher than among nonmilitary Australians, according to a government report last year.
Morrison has been under pressure to tackle the issue amid a high-profile campaign by Julie-Ann Finney, whose son David, a former naval petty officer, committed suicide last year.
“Too many young Australians have taken their own lives, and we need concerted actions in all of these areas to ensure that we’re doing everything we possibly can to prevent this,” the prime minister told reporters in Canberra.
A permanent commissioner would head the inquiry with the power to investigate individual cases of suspected and attempted suicide, as well as make recommendations to support suicide prevention and improve mental health and wellbeing.
The commissioner, who has yet to appointed, would deliver a report to the parliament within 12 months.
SERIOUS FIGURES
In 2018, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order directing government departments to try to prevent suicide among military veterans by treating mental health problems before they become more serious.
According to US Department of Veterans Affairs statistics, 6,139 US veterans died by suicide in 2017, a rate 1.5 times higher than for nonveteran adults.
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