About 15% of Thai high school students are at risk of suicide, according to findings from the Bureau of Mental Health Service Administration.

The department has recently completed an assessment of the mental health of more than 130,000 students aged under 18. The findings show 56.31% are “normal”, 9.18% are listed as vulnerable to depression and 15.86% are prone to harming themselves or committing suicide.

Dr. Dusadee Juengsirakulwit, a director of the department, explained that the main cause of the students’ mental health problems is that they worry about their studies and could not adapt to studying at home during the COVID-19 pandemic, in addition to known problems such as bullying by classmates and conflicts with the elders in their families.

She said that family members can help by monitoring students for signs of abnormalities, such as depression, stress, frustration, not wanting to go to school or not doing things that they used to do regularly.

Meanwhile, schools in the north-eastern province of Nakhon Ratchasima have been advised to install window grilles and additional CCTV cameras, to prevent students from accidentally falling from school buildings.

This new measure was recommended by officials from the provincial branch of the Office of Basic Education Commission, following the fatal fall of a student from a school building in Muang District.

According to the parents of the victim, the student was normal and joyful but, of late, had begun to keep to himself and spent more time alone playing video games.

Two other fatal falls involving high-school students were reported in the same province on May 31st and August 15th.

It is also recommended that teachers form a Line group, so that they can discuss the behaviour of their students, in the hope of identifying whether any of them are at risk of becoming depressed and need counselling.

Source: Thai Public Broadcasting Service