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A new study shows that suicide prevention for young people doesn’t work.
This highlights a disturbing truth: the mental health establishment never had proof that these interventions worked in the first place. For decades, schools, clinics, and policymakers have rolled out programs built on hopeful theory, not data, effectively experimenting on children in real time.
The study, published in JAMA Pediatrics, analyzed decades of research on treatments such as cognitive behavioral therapy, school-based prevention programs, medication, crisis lines, and “gatekeeper” training. None showed statistically significant reductions in suicide mortality among children, teens, or young adults.
What the study ignores is credible evidence that constantly telling children not to kill themselves can plant the idea itself, amplifying social contagion rather than preventing it.
The authors conclude that there is a need for “novel, developmentally and trauma-informed treatments, as well as multilevel interventions to target the increasing suicide risk among youths.”
But wouldn’t the logical conclusion be that the very people who failed to stop suicide and may have even made it worse should NOT be the ones designing what comes next?