By Vickie Skorji | Lifeline Services Director
Dear friend
The impact of COVID-19 continues to take a heavy toll globally on people's mental health. In March this year, the WHO released a statement that the prevalence of anxiety and depression had increased by 25% due to the pandemic. Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General, went on to say that the pandemic has impacted the mental health of young people and disproportionally placing them at risk of suicidal and self-harming behaviors. “This is a wake-up call to all countries to pay more attention to mental health and better support their populations’ mental health.
At TELL, we have been working hard to increase our Lifeline support to those in need and connect with as many users as possible. Since November, we have offered 143 additional shifts, 85 shifts with more than one support worker, and 572 extra hours of support. In March this year, we began offering both phone and chat support every night from 7 pm - 11 pm and are working towards continuous coverage of both chat and phone support across all shifts every day of the year.
The increased shift coverage has been made possible by your donations and support of our Lifeline support worker training program. Through your support, we have been able to increase our support worker numbers from 115 to 140 over the past 12 months. Still, around 800 chats and phone calls go unanswered every month, and the youth suicide rate in Japan remains high.
In May this year, TELL will run our first ever Summer Support Worker training to further increase our volunteer numbers. Your donations play a vital role in funding the Lifeline Support worker training and, in turn, increasing our volunteer numbers and our hours of support. Thank you, everyone, for your support of our Lifeline; as we strive for 24/7 coverage, we will continue to give hope and connections to our users, one call or chat at a time.
Vickie Skorji
Lifeline Services Director
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