Our Health & Wellbeing team facilitated an influential and very well-attended Suicide Awareness Symposium at the Gordon Messenger Centre Commando Training Centre Royal Marines in Lympstone at the beginning of September.
It brought together for the first time over 50 suicide awareness and prevention experts working in and supporting the wider Armed Forces community. It attracted representatives from the NHS, specialist welfare, Chaplaincy, and from partner organisations such SSAFA (The Armed Forces Charity), Walking with the Wounded, Help for Heroes and ZSA (Zero Suicide Alliance).
During the Symposium, the Charity unveiled the first of a series of compelling new ‘Lifting the Lid’ videos, marking the next stage of our Mental Health Campaign, used to reinforce the message that what you see of someone on the outside is not necessarily what they are feeling on the inside.
This campaign has been generously supported by the Armed Forces Covenant Trust Fund ‘One Is Too Many’ as part of a two-year project, the aim being to reduce suicide risks within vulnerable veterans in a co-ordinated and targeted way.
Our September Symposium was testament to the cross-organisational engagement which is taking place between our specialist communities on suicide awareness matters, and we were heartened by the number of experts in this field who accepted the invitation to attend.
“We are all striving to encourage healthy behaviours and mental fitness. We want to do everything possible, alongside our Royal Navy and Royal Marine Reservist colleagues, to make it even more acceptable for our Corps Family to reach out for support when they need it.”
Danny Egan, RMA – The Royal Marines Charity Director for Health & Wellbeing