The number of military service members who have taken their lives in the first six months of this year has already surpassed the annual average of about 15 from 2017 to last year.
Some have attributed the rise to increased cross-strait tensions, while others have said it was because one-year compulsory service returned on Jan. 1 after it had been shortened to four months from 2013.
Association of Human Rights for Military Personnel founder Chen Pi-e (陳碧娥) said she believes that workload, not service length, is a more likely source of stress for military personnel.
Photo: Ann Wang, Reuters
The number of troops has plummeted from about 500,000 in 2001 to about 160,000 today, meaning fewer recruits are handling more responsibilities, Chen said.
Moreover, the nation’s falling birthrate has also led the military to accept “substandard” recruits, she said.
“There is insufficient staff at the lowest levels within the military. Compared with a few decades ago, one service member now has to take on many roles,” she said.
“With greater pressure, combined with recruits who already have a lot of problems, it is only logical that the number of suicides would rise,” she said, adding that many recruits are either psychologically unfit for service or joined the military as a last resort due to financial troubles.
Lo Shih-mao (羅時茂), a psychiatrist from the military-run Tri-Service General Hospital’s Beitou Branch in Taipei, said that factors not exclusive to those in the armed forces, such as bereavement and relationship issues, can lead to someone attempting suicide.
Young, newly enlisted service members and those who have difficulty readjusting following deployment, as well as those with mental health issues might also be at greater risk, Lo said.
That soldiers have access to lethal weapons increases the chances that an act of self-harm could be fatal, he said.
The relatively closed environment within the military might also make it more susceptible to “suicide clusters,” he said.
Over the years, the Ministry of National Defense has said that the suicide rate among soldiers is relatively lower than that of the general population or the US military.
During a legislative session in 2021, then-deputy minister of national defense Wang Shin-lung (王信龍) said the suicide rate among military personnel was about 7.9 per 100,000 people, while the average suicide rate in the general population was 13.2 per 100,000 people.
However, in late March, then-minister of national defense Chiu Kuo-cheng (邱國正) said that suicides within the armed forces were “on the rise,” adding that the incidents were “regrettable,” while pledging to enhance military counseling.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Hsu Chiao-hsin (徐巧芯) have said that the defense ministry has a serious lack of mental health counselors.
According to data provided by Wu, among the more than 150 suicides or attempted suicide cases within the military from 2019 to last year, only 11 of them had been on the ministry’s counseling list.
That means that as much as 93 percent of the people who should have been on the watch list were not.
Among the 99 military personnel who died of suicide during the same period, only five were previously on the counseling list.
“The numbers show that the armed forces’ suicide prevention mechanism is not working,” Wu said during an April 24 legislative session.
DPP Legislator Hung Sun-han (洪申翰) said the military has only about 400 military counselors, meaning that about one counselor has to meet the needs of 400 soldiers.
Meanwhile, only 69 of them are certified counselors, Wu said.
Chen said the root of the issue goes back to the lack of sufficient staffing within the armed forces.
That deficiency means that the chief counselor of a military unit, whose primary job is to maintain soldiers’ mental health, has to be responsible for other jobs, such as political warfare, military promotion and tasks handed down from their superiors.
“They are too busy to focus on all their duties and do not have the time nor the professional skills required to care for troops’ mental health,” she said.
The Ministry of National Defense has said that most military personnel who tried to harm themselves this year did so due to family or financial reasons, or depression.
The ministry said it has continued to enhance mental health education among military personnel to prevent self-harm.
Tri-Service General Hospital’s Beitou Branch has arranged 82 workshops and lecturers on suicide prevention to visit military units around the country this year, the ministry said.
The military is also making sure service members know where to ask for help, including by working with civilian counseling organizations to provide counseling services, it added.
If you are experiencing suicidal thoughts, please call the 1925 or 1995 hotlines.
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