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Opinionista

Employers need to take greater cognisance of employees’ mental health to stop rising suicides

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Bonang Mohale is chancellor of the University of the Free State, former president of Business Unity South Africa (BUSA), professor of practice at the Johannesburg Business School (JBS) in the College of Business and Economics and chairperson of The Bidvest Group, ArcelorMittal and SBV Services. He is a member of the Community of Chairpersons (CoC) of the World Economic Forum and author of two bestselling books, Lift As You Rise and Behold The Turtle. He has been included in Reputation Poll International’s (RPI) 2023 list of the “100 Most Reputable Africans”. He is the recipient of the 2023 ME-Vision Academy’s “Exclusive Recognition in Successful Leadership” award.

Now, more than ever, our colleagues must feel needed, valued, wanted and appreciated because we have succeeded in creating a conducive environment where each and every solitary employee can feel comfortable in showing up and know that they can be themselves.

“We don’t have to do all of it alone. We were never meant to.” — Brené Brown 

This is the year (or two) like no other! The Spanish Flu of 1918 lasted two years and came in two waves — with the second killing more people than the first. Now, in the midst of Covid-19, the whole of South Africa, communities, families and individuals, is experiencing fear, shared grief and is in collective mourning. 

In the grip of the twice-as-fast second wave, driven partly by a highly transmissible 501Y.V2 mutation of the virus, with the exponential rise in the number of infections exceeding 1 million, deaths at about 28,000, the country faces another moment of reckoning. On 30 December 2020, we saw the highest single-day increase in cases, recorded at 17,710 and 181,564 confirmed active cases. Since our index patient on 5 March 2020, our average daily number of confirmed infections is 3,310 and since our first death on 27 March, our average daily number of deaths is 97. We now experience a 2.69% mortality rate locally versus a 2.2% rate globally. This is as a result of high patient volumes, which have left public and private hospitals running out of intensive care beds and oxygen. 

What exacerbates this already alarming situation is our major national December holidays and associated mass interprovincial travel and ordinarily large festivities. As a response, much tougher restrictions have been imposed in all provinces. Our best personal response is not to wait for the vaccine that might only reach our shores after the middle of 2021, but to change our behaviours and fully comply with all the health protocols.

Today’s corporate challenges are hampered investor confidence in the midst of economic volatility, the emergence of new business models and supply chains (where the weakest link will determine performance and no performance means no pay and therefore, no future), while original core competencies are being seriously tested. 

This pandemic has paved the way for a new structure of working, where work is no longer the place we go to but what we do — where our colleagues are totally mobile, totally available and totally insecure. Where, precisely because you are alone, the temptation might be to avoid taking any decisions because of the fear of the consequences, uncertainty of the answer and analysis paralysis. 

We know for sure that to excel during this pandemic, we have to anticipate and address multiple challenges through flexible adaptation, evolution and ongoing customer-led innovation. Where today’s market drivers are survival, cash (not just cost containment) preservation, strengthening the balance sheet, added value without additional costs, guaranteed results, minimal fixed/maximum variable costs, public-private partnerships, increasingly complex service solutions are being explored, technological advances stretch the imagination, financially led solutions are increasingly frequent and real estate (property is the problem and accommodation is the only solution) rationalisation is imperative. 

So, 2020 was filled with challenges and uncertainty. In fact, the word ‘unprecedented’ trended 90% higher in web searches last year than in 2019, which tells us a lot about the state of the world. However, what that spike doesn’t show us is how 2020 has affected people’s mental health. 

Close to 1,781 people in the country committed suicide in the four months following the declaration of the lockdown in March. In May, some mental health experts told SABC News that many South Africans are increasingly experiencing depression due to financial burdens and stress brought about by the coronavirus pandemic and resultant lockdown. They say Covid-19 has sparked anxiety, panic and an increase in substance abuse. 

Globally, every year, close to 800,000 people take their own lives and many more people attempt suicide. Every suicide is a tragedy that affects families, communities and entire countries, and has longlasting effects on the people left behind. Suicide occurs throughout the lifespan and was the second-leading cause of death among 15- to 29-year-olds globally in 2016. 

Especially now that most people are working remotely, often alone with little human interaction, in organisations we must reiterate that our people (and their families) must continue to be safe, comply and respect their neighbours. 

Suicide does not just occur in high-income countries, but is a global phenomenon in all regions of the world. Over 79% of global suicides occurred in low- and middle-income countries in 2016. Suicide is a serious global public health problem, however, it is preventable with timely, evidence-based and often low-cost interventions. For national responses to be effective, a comprehensive multisectoral suicide prevention strategy is needed.

South Africa urgently needs to put in place mechanisms not only to deal with the devastating social impact of Covid-19, whether from the trauma of the economic fallout from the virus, but also the loss of human lives and the effect of cabin fever from the lockdowns. Record numbers of people are already suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder – the combination of stress, anxiety and depression. 

It is very likely that incidents of suicides are likely to jump in a country with already high suicide rates. South Africa has the eighth-highest rate of suicide in the world, with around 8,000 people committing suicide every year — the third-biggest cause of unnatural death after homicide and unintentional reasons. 

There are two main sources of data about the epidemiology of suicide in South Africa, namely retrospective reviews of mortuary records and the National Injury Mortality Surveillance System, implemented in 1999 to collate data from a sample of mortuaries. These sources, which employ descriptive statistics and correlations, provide some insight into the frequency of suicide and its risk factors, but fail to add much to understanding why South Africans take their lives by suicide. 

It is a fact that suicide is also a public health concern in South Africa. Violence, whether in families, on the roads, workplaces, educational institutions and in communities, is also on the rise. There has been a terrifying rise in domestic violence, and abuse of women and children. There is a rise in marriage breakdowns as well as drug and alcohol abuse. So too is a rise in familicide – murder-suicide or murder in which a person kills multiple close family members, such as spouses, children and relatives.

Especially now that most people are working remotely, often alone with little human interaction, in organisations we must reiterate that our people (and their families) must continue to be safe, comply and respect their neighbours. 

This will enable companies to continue to achieve high performance with high integrity and employees will also continue making quality decisions at high speed, with leadership from every seat (not just the C-Suite), thereby increasing employee engagement, agility, sustainability and resilience. The intent is to achieve high levels of inclusiveness where the leadership is constantly respectful, visible, supportive, understanding and is literally felt by our employees and therefore increase the feelings of connection and caring. 

Now, more than ever, our colleagues must feel needed, valued, wanted and appreciated because we have succeeded in creating a conducive environment where each and every solitary employee can feel comfortable in showing up and know that they can be themselves. Where especially their individual career pathing and succession planning is continuously discussed, affirmed and reiterated. DM

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