Policy Brief: Action Plan for Suicide Prevention in Australia

This policy brief, prepared by a student, addresses the critical issue of suicide prevention in Australia. It begins by outlining the policy challenge, emphasizing the global scale of suicide and its devastating impact, particularly among youth. The brief identifies the need for governmental action, including the development of new strategies and the allocation of resources to support those at risk. It emphasizes the importance of collaboration between state laws, law enforcement, and community stakeholders, including the World Health Organization and welfare organizations. The student proposes an action plan that involves raising public awareness, providing training, and advocating for policy changes. The brief concludes by underscoring the need for international cooperation and the establishment of effective suicide prevention legislation, including the involvement of public health and mental health organizations, to reduce global suicide rates.

Running Head: SOCIAL POLICY 1
Policy Brief on Suicide Prevention
Name
Institution

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POLICY BRIEF ON SUICIDE PREVENTION
Action plan
1. Description of the policy challenge and the problems I am aiming to address
Policies are always established by the government in a country or a nation state in order
to create better changes in the nation and to improve the people’s welfare in the region, nation or
community members that are residing within that territory. For this assignment I chose to discuss
on the policy on policy brief on suicide prevention. This policy was established by the
government in Australia to ensure that there is a way in which people can resolve their issues
without taking their lives. The state laws of the government have major effects when it comes to
prevention of the suicidal cases within the nation. Research has shown that the people who are at
higher risks of getting involved in the suicidal cases are mostly the generation of the youths and
the experts.
The challenge to this policy is that suicide is an international spectacle. A greater number
of people die yearly in every parts of the world because of committing suicide. This is a great
challenge because it is a phenomenon that keeps on occurring however how much the
government tries to stop it. Suicide has been recognized as the biggest problem in the public
sectors in various parts of the world. This is because of the increasing number of reports about
this phenomenon to the World Health Organization yearly. It has also been noticed that the costs
that are associated with committing suicide in communities is due to the dangerous inspirations
on the founding of the national policies. Suicide is an act that is still not understood better why it
has to happen and the ways to prevent it has also been a major problem because it keeps on
happening year in year out. Suicide has a long-term mental effect to the people who are always

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left behind because that feeling of torture in the mental operations of the beloved ones of the
victims never goes away easily. Suicide has both direct and indirect effects to the World Health
Organization and the societies where such acts keep occurring. (Fiske, 2018).
2. The policy response I am seeking for and the approaches
The policy response that I am seeking is how to arrive at the solutions that can help
prevent the daily occurrence of suicide in various nations and the world at large. The solutions
should come from the state laws and new strategies that should in place to help in preventing this
phenomenon. It is time for state laws in various parts of the world to come together into
collaboration so that they can sit, reason, open doors and come up with several ways to control
suicide from occurring. They should create awareness in people about this phenomenon and train
them on how stop it from happening. When this debate is supposed to be taken further, it would
require wise reasoning. The report heightens a vision for enhancing human improvement over
the ways in which suicide can be prevented. At the nationwide level it pressures the necessity to
create new policies at the local levels so that people get to understand on how to prevent suicide.
The policy approaches that I am looking for are governmental change towards the above policy
and subsidy of services in order to give support to the people, group or nations who are in need.
The governmental change would eventually lead to the formation of new strategies that are more
considerate to each and every individual within the specified territory. There should also be
advanced resolutions and tangible strategies to endorse human reasoning and ways resolving
issues to prevent them from taking the path of suicide. The clear evidence that these approaches
will be effective is the alarming effects that suicide has caused in societies and they really yearn
for ways to help reduce it.

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3. The context
The governing bodies involved are those who normally formulate the strategies like the
government of a state. The law enforcement team is also involved because they have to ensure
the established policies are followed strictly by the citizens. The other governing bodies involved
are the government officials within the community who must ensure that the policy is
maintained. The policy actors include the social actors who are concerned with the prosperity of
the social sector in the community. The other policy actors are the target groups for this policy.
The target groups in this case are the members of the World Health Organization and the
members of the society.
The bureaucracies that need to be considered in making changes for above policy are the
State Las. The state laws should establish policies including at the local levels which include
schools and the members of the society. The state laws should ensure that the societies and
schools adapt to the policies for preventing suicidal cases and learning on the ways of how to
approach this behavior. The teachers in schools, counselors for students, health care teams, the
law enforcing bodies and other concerned people should be given the authority and
responsibilities to ensure that they train the people they are handling on how to prevent suicide;
how to approach the behavior and creating awareness in them. The networks who should also be
considered in this case are the stakeholders for health organizations and land and the welfare
organization teams. By considering such networks would make the process of solving the above
policy challenge even much easier because such networks are always at the top positions when it
comes to fighting for a change in order to enhance welfare for citizens residing within a nation.
In order to ensure that the challenges of policy on suicide prevention are solved, there is need to
consider the governing political parties in a nation. The political parties are always preferred

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because they play a bigger role when it comes to policy making. With the use of the existing
legislative procedures, the political parties and the government have a dominant role in
formulation of the policies that govern a state. Therefore in this case, they would be the best
consideration because everyone is concerned with the rates at which suicide is occurring and
they all need a solution to the problem.
4. Use of language
In relation to the policy brief on suicide prevention, the arising challenges have led to the
rise of mental for the individuals left behind and it has also caused in either way direct and
indirect effects to the health organizations and the communities at large. In regards to the policy
challenges, there have been increased cases of poverty in the nation, anxiety, decrease in
population and increased numbers of orphans because the victims who commit suicide leave
families behind with responsibilities and decrease in the population of the society. The stories
that are always told about this policy challenge are stories about the homes and societies where
people have committed suicide, the mental problems they cause to the people left behind and the
continual occurrence of suicide in the society.
5. The sequence I will follow when advocating for a change
Most of the fundamentals recognize that they cannot just change a legislation that is
recognized by the law directly, however there are some processes to follow when advocating for
a policy change. In my case I would follow some procedures in advocating for the above policy
change before and after the legislation process. First of all I would establish a vision and my
vision would be the creation of awareness in people in all parts of the nation about suicide,
training them on how to approach the behavior and establishing policies to help them prevent the

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progressive suicide occurrences. Secondly, I would conduct a research and inform any policy
debate on the policy challenge. The next step I would take in advocating for the above policy
change is educating other people who are not aware of the policy challenges. I would hold
educational forums and discuss with the members of public about the concerns and needs that
should be implemented. In the forums I would aim at addressing the legislation body on the
issue. When this debate is supposed to be taken further, it would require wise reasoning. The
report heightens a vision for enhancing human improvement over the ways in which suicide can
be prevented. At the nationwide level it pressures the necessity to create new policies at the local
levels so that people get to understand on how to prevent suicide.
The next step I would take in advocating for the policy change is by giving support to the
advocacy organizations by appreciating their activities and this would motivate them to become
my valuable partners for the same. My policy change will get on the agenda when the other
advocacy organizations come together to support my project and I will inform them on the
changes that are supposed to be made including my vision. The agenda would also be made
aware to the legislation bodies through the public forums that I shall have held before. The new
language that I would be using during this process is the need for teamwork and collaboration of
the state laws. My ideas for change would fit in the new resolutions towards the above policy and
they include training people and creating new policies at local levels to help in the prevention of
suicide occurrence.
In conclusion, policy challenges delays the developments that are supposed to take place
in many nations. Therefore, there is need for governmental change towards the above policy and
subsidy of services in order to give support to the people, group or nations who are in need. The
governmental change would eventually lead to the formation of new strategies that are more

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considerate to each and every individual within the specified territory. There should also be
advanced resolutions and tangible strategies to endorse human reasoning and ways resolving
issues to prevent them from taking the path of suicide. Suicide is a global phenomenon that
requires international collaboration through formulation of new strategies that can help prevent
the act. There is need to establish legislations on suicide prevention within the state government
which includes the public health and the mental organizations. The global suicide rate is so high
and it needs a faster response before it worsens even more.

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References
Fiske, H. (2018). Applications of Solution-focused Brief Therapy in the Policy on Suicide
Prevention. Suicide Prevention, 185-197. doi:10.1007/0-306-47210-4_20.