Let's Talk About - Suicide Attempts: A Crime or Not?
Preliminary Thoughts
Being someone who is pursuing a career in Mental Health in the near future, I am greatly encouraged by the recent move by the Malaysian Parliament to take steps towards decriminalizing suicide attempts through the Mental Health (Amendment) Bill 2023. The Bill would remove Section 309 of the Penal Code which punishes suicide attempts with fine / jail or both.
I am a newbie at this, but it was curious that it was not really that hot of a topic, at least not in my social circles as much as I thought it would be. I am all for creating the awareness and generating the discussion that would put the talk about mental health in our daily conversations. From what I thought from the get-go, would be that there are only benefits to this move.
Pros
I, for one, thought that decriminalizing suicide attempts would be a positive step towards having more conversations about and with people who are struggling with their mental health in general. People who have attempted suicide are clearly in need of help and support, and decriminalizing this action (or rather, inaction) would mean that they have one thing less to worry about, should they already be in such a dire situation.
I believe also that with this Bill, in the event that someone is 'caught' attempting suicide, that crisis intervention officers (police etc) would be able to take that person into custody and bring them to a government psychiatric hospital or a gazetted private facility instead. That would be a positive move, should the person not be in a position or in the right state of mind to request for help on their own. Hopefully through greater awareness of mental health issues, people would be able to get the help and support that they need.
Do note that they also did not remove the offence of helping someone attempt suicide, which still remains a crime. This is especially so for vulnerable people, such as children and the people who are unable to make decisions on their own.
Although it will take time for it for things to be seen how would this play out in practice, but I think this is a necessary step for Malaysia to move towards, in order to follow the footsteps of other nations who have done so: Sweden (1864), Finland (1910), New Zealand (1961), Hong Kong (1967), Canada (1972), Ireland (1993), Sri Lanka (1998), India (2017), and Singapore (2020) (Marsh, 2020). I pray that this step would also reduce the stigma associated with mental health issues as this topic is debated in our Parliament and bring to light that such topics are important to the Malaysian public, and government as well.
Cons
However, with every camp there are people who are for and against a change. I have heard that that decriminalizing suicide attempts could push people to consider suicide as a viable option now that it is no longer a crime (or soon to be). There are few researches that go into negative effects of decriminalization. If any, it is a topic for another day.
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