Significant increase in calls to emergency phones during the corona crisis

Mobile phoneMobile phone. Photo:Pixabay

Both Kirkens SOS and Mental Helse have experienced a great deal of pressure on their telephone lines over the past two months, including a doubling in conversations about suicide.

In the past two months, Kirkens SOS has received up to 900 calls a day, which is around 300 more calls than normal, according to TV 2.

19 per cent of the calls that were answered were about suicide, which is twice as many as usual.

Specialist Advisor Lene Hopland Bergset at Kirkens SOS says that the proportion of conversations in which suicide has been the topic has remained stable for many years at between 9 and 10 per cent.

“Of those, between 1.2 and 1.5 per cent have been considered acute cases. Here too we see a doubling now,” she says.

Since the corona measures introduced March 12 to May 10, Kirkens SOS has received over 43,000 calls. The organization has received 600 to 900 calls per day, while there are usually 500 to 600 calls.

At Mental Helse too, the number of calls has increased significantly. In March and April this year, they received 85 per cent more inquiries compared to the same period last year. Here, too, there are several that talk about suicide.

“It is worrying that there are so many people who feel like this, that they go around with such thoughts. Life was already difficult for many before the corona measures were implemented, and the situation does not make it any better,” says General Manager Aslaug Timland Dale.

© NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today

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