How Japan’s suicide capital stopped its citizens killing themselves
- Suicide has a long history in Japan as a way to avoid shame or dishonour, and getting psychological help was stigmatised
Taeko Watanabe awoke one cold March night and found a trail of blood in the hallway, a bloody cleaver on her son Yuki’s bed and no trace of him in the house. Then police discovered a suicide note in his bedroom.
“They found him in a canal by the temple and wrapped him in a blanket. After an autopsy, he came home in a coffin. I fell apart,” she recalled, eyes welling up as she sat by a photo of Yuki and a Buddhist altar laden with flowers and Fuji apples.
Yuki, who was 29 when he died in 2008, was one of many who committed suicide that year in Akita prefecture, 450km north of Tokyo. For nearly two decades, Akita had the highest suicide rate in all of Japan, which itself has the highest rate in the G7.
But things have changed, Watanabe said. If her son faced the same situation now, “he would never have died. There are people who can prevent it”.
Watanabe, who contemplated suicide herself after Yuki’s death, now leads a suicide survivors group, part of national efforts that have brought Japanese suicides down by nearly 40 per cent in 15 years, exceeding the government target. Akita’s are at their lowest in 40 years.
These efforts took off nationally in 2007 with a comprehensive suicide prevention plan, as academics and government agencies identified at-risk groups. In 2016, regions got more freedom to develop plans that fit local thinking.
Corporations, prompted by lawsuits from families of those who took their lives because of overwork, have made it easier to take leave; more offer psychological support, and a law caps overtime. The government mandates annual stress tests in companies with over 50 employees.