The Ministry of Health and Welfare will push to introduce a system that continues to contact and visit suicide attempters who refuse counseling. It also plans to elevate the suicide emergency response system from a local-government-centered model to the national level by creating a National Suicide Response Office that involves the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the Korean National Police Agency, and the National Fire Agency.
On the 28th, the ministry reported its plan to strengthen suicide emergency response measures at a Cabinet meeting. The core of the plan is the consolidation into a single system from detecting risk to dispatch and first response, stabilization and treatment, close follow-up after discharge, and return to daily life.
These measures are also a follow-up after President Lee Jae-myung, since taking office, identified suicide prevention as a key state agenda. At his first Cabinet meeting after taking office in June last year, Lee said, "Why is our country's suicide rate so high?" and called for measures. In a work briefing by the Ministry of Health and Welfare on the 16th, he also defined suicide prevention as a core task the government must manage intensively and directed stronger responses.
Starting with these emergency response measures, the government plans to sequentially announce the remaining "nine key areas of suicide prevention," including isolated and at-risk families, caregiving and nursing burdens, protection for special-duty groups, and support for recovery of crime victims.
◇ Even if counseling is refused, "manage to the end"…push to revise the law
The biggest change the ministry put forward is the post-attempt management approach for suicide attempters.
Under the current Suicide Prevention Act, if a suicide attempter does not consent to counseling and the use of personal information, the Suicide Prevention Center must destroy the related information. After that, it cannot provide follow-up management such as additional contact or visits, leading to repeated cases in which high-risk groups with a high chance of reattempt drop out of the management system.
To fill this gap, the ministry will pursue legal revisions. It plans to establish a management system that continues to contact and visit even those suicide attempters who refuse or discontinue counseling and treatment.
At a briefing, Lee Seon-young, Director General for Mental Health Policy at the ministry, said, "We will develop a model that continues to contact and visit people who do not consent to counseling or treatment," adding, "A legal basis is needed, and since this also involves personal information protection, we will work out the details through social consensus."
As reference models, cases in Gimhae, South Gyeongsang, and the Netherlands were presented. Gimhae leaves notes and contact information at the homes of suicide attempters who refused counseling, while in the Netherlands, a multidisciplinary team of physicians, nurses, social workers, and peer supporters builds trust through repeated visits and counseling and supports solutions to daily life problems.
Even before revising the law, the ministry plans to consult with platform operators on repeatedly displaying guidance for the 109 counseling line and suicide prevention content to users searching for suicide or self-harm, within a scope that does not collect personal information. The specific platforms for consultation have not been finalized.
◇ From local governments to the nation…creation of a "National Suicide Response Office"
The suicide emergency response system will also be reorganized under national leadership.
The ministry moved to revamp the system out of a judgment that on-site response capacity remains insufficient. Last year, police and fire dispatched to suicide attempt scenes about 51,000 times, but cases where Suicide Prevention Center professionals joined the dispatch numbered 3,738, only about 7% of the total. This means many cases requiring professional mental health intervention did not receive sufficient support at the initial response stage.
Currently, whether to dispatch to emergency incidents, how to assess risk, and what follow-up actions to take are determined and closed by basic local governments and their commissioned agencies on their own.
The ministry will establish a National Suicide Response Office where the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the Korean National Police Agency, and the National Fire Agency work together to integrate management of suicide attempts and deaths nationwide. From dispatch to protection, counseling, treatment, and support, the office will manage the entire process, and it will also handle on-site suicide risk assessments and assign follow-up agencies.
In particular, for cases where beds are insufficient or linkage to psychiatric institutions is difficult, the National Suicide Response Office will take charge of overall management, including bed allocation and transport. It will also analyze economic and social indicators, such as bankruptcies of corporations, to proactively manage regions where suicide risk may rise.
The timing and size of the National Suicide Response Office have not been finalized. The director general said, "Inter-ministerial consultations are complete, but we are working on budget and organization talks," adding, "We will disclose specifics when budget talks conclude and we announce the 6th Basic Plan for Suicide Prevention." The office will operate based on the provision for linking suicide attempter information under the Suicide Prevention Act, without separate legislation.
◇ 109 counselors to double…plugging ER care gaps
The function for detecting crises will also be strengthened.
Counselors for the Suicide Prevention Hotline (109) will increase from 103 to 200. Of the first 35 hires, after training, they will be deployed on site from late August to early September, and including additional hires, the 200-counselor system is expected to be in place around October to November. Using AI, repetitive tasks such as writing counseling records will be automated so counselors can focus on actual counseling, and links with private counseling organizations such as LifeLine will be strengthened.
Problems in which ERs delay or refuse physical treatment of suicide attempters due to the absence of a psychiatrist will also be addressed. The ministry will build a cooperative system between emergency medical institutions and psychiatric institutions and run a pilot program to link patients to psychiatric treatment facilities once physical treatment is completed. It also plans to pilot a "temporary protection service for suicide attempters" starting next year, providing 24-hour professional counseling and case management for those whose physical injuries are minor and who are discharged home.
The ministry plans to run a pilot program that immediately links patients to psychiatric treatment facilities once physical treatment is completed by building a cooperative system between emergency medical institutions and psychiatric institutions. Through prearranged MOUs between hospitals, it will minimize treatment gaps and establish a system in which the National Suicide Response Office supports bed allocation and transport.
In addition, regional psychiatric emergency medical centers will increase from 13 to 17, and acute psychiatric intensive treatment beds will rise from 391 to 2,000 by 2030. The ministry will also pursue designating psychiatric emergencies as essential medical care.
The "joint response team," in which police and mental health professionals are dispatched together to the scene, will also be expanded. Currently, 11 teams are operating in 10 cities and provinces. The government will gradually expand these by increasing professional staff at mental health welfare centers, and in situations where dispatch of professionals is difficult, it will introduce a system to assess suicide risk via video.
◇ "Goal to reduce suicide deaths by more than 1,000 this year"
According to the ministry, the monthly number of suicide deaths has declined for seven consecutive months year over year since October last year. The average decrease rate from January to April this year is 12.8%, and the number of suicide deaths in April was a provisional 1,061, down 15.7% from a year earlier.
While the ministry expects these measures to help lower the suicide reattempt rate, it said it is difficult to present a specific reattempt rate target. It will maintain the goal of reducing this year's suicide deaths by more than 1,000 from last year and will sequentially announce follow-up suicide prevention measures.