Ending Suicide Attempts with Nets?
The residents of the Bay Area are going to be footing the bill for a 40- to 50-million dollar metal net to help stop suicides of those who would jump off the Golden Gate Bridge. The Golden Gate Transportation District’s board of directors approved the project last month.
Discussions here and here attempt to refute the possibility that this expensive project will serve no effect as it will drive those contemplating suicide to make their attempt somewhere else or in some other manner. The problem with the numbers in the latter link is that they conclude (see this study) that because only 6% of the 515 thwarted Golden Gate jumpers eventually committed suicide, that static barriers to suicide will have the same effect. The authors of that paper state that a liability of their methodology is it doesn’t consider those who may have eventually committed suicide outside of California.
But I think it has a much, much larger liability: it only considers individuals who were “restrained.” In other words, the people who were studied, had been actively thwarted; they experienced an intervention of some sort. A static barrier (metal net) is much different than an intervention by law enforcement or health professionals. You cannot assert that the metal net will help convince suicidal people from taking their lives as well as compassionate human beings can.
Sadly, I don’t have any studies to challenge the claims that the nets will work. It stands to reason that these studies likely cannot exist as there almost certainly is a massic paucity of data from suicidal people who decided to abort an attempt because of a physical barrier and instead did or did not move on to another method. The people, by virtue of their willingess to end it all as opposed to seeking help from others, are not likely to report their change of heart upon seeing the sight of a metal net.
Now, I’m not saying I’m right. I’m saying that the study seems to suggest ONLY that of those who experienced a compassionate intervention when trying to jump of the Golden Gate Bridge had a low rate of subsequent suicide. I’ll go out on a limb and assert that an expensive net will not have the same effect. It may have a positive effect, but not as extreme as the supporters will have you believe. And lucky for them, they’ll no one will be able to disprove them.
It is sad that so many people think that preventing access to things (edges of bridges, guns, etc) will prevent suicides. What actually does seems to work is people paying attention to eachother and helping out when they see warning signs.
