Chinese University of Hong Kong steps up efforts to help students after sixth suicide
Psychiatrist will visit campus once a week, midnight counselling hotline will be set up and an ad hoc group will examine mental health issues among students
The Chinese University is to step up its counselling service under emergency measures worked out after the institution lost another of its students to suicide over the weekend.
A psychiatrist will be hired to visit the campus once a week to see students with needs, and three more counsellors are being recruited for the student affairs office to expand the team there from eight to 11.
READ MORE: Fears for Hong Kong students after fifth suicide at Chinese University since start of academic year
The university will also set up a midnight counselling hotline in cooperation with the Federation of Youth Groups.
The measures were approved at a crisis management meeting on Monday chaired by university vice-chancellor and president Professor Joseph Sung Jao-yiu.
At the meeting, university management also appointed an ad hoc panel including experts and students who had sought counselling assistance to examine mental health problems among students and find ways to improve services offered by the university.
While there is currently no resident psychiatrist at the university, a university spokesman said same-day referral of cases to experts was available.
“To strengthen the service, we have hired a psychiatrist to come to the campus once a week to offer a service to students when needed,” said the spokesman.