Bullying and childhood suicides, is there a link?

As reported by the national charity Beatbullying this week, as many as 44% of child suicides in the UK are as a result of bullying, while in all the bullying related suicides investigated, school was singled out as the major source and of persecution.  Meanwhile, according to the Centers for Disease Control, suicide is the fourth leading cause of death amongst children aged 10 to 14. 

Bullying is not a new phenomenon; it used to happen when I was at school many years ago, although unfortunately modern day bullying is more insidious than when I was a lad when it was in most cases just a bit of name calling and taunting accompanied with maybe some rude gestures.  These days bowever bullying is just as likely to be the spreading of malicious gossip and untruthful rumours; the taking, hiding or damaging of personal belongings; physical assaults; racial taunts as well as ostracising individuals from peer groups due to their sexuality, disability, gender or age.   Of course there is also the cyberbullying where bullying takes place online, by email and on social networking sites, and is also a contributory factor leading to a child taking their own life.

Beatbullying is asking for the new coalition government to conduct a comprehensive study to identify the scale of bullying related suicides, in order to put improved preventative measures in place. It has also requested that the government offers more funding to schemes such as Beatbullying's peer mentoring website CyberMentors, which has seen more than 400,000 children access the site over the last year, and which provides young people the chance to talk confidentially online about their issues and concerns with mentors of a similar age (or if necessary with trained counsellors).

Have you or your children been subject to bullying?  Do you think it is worse these days?  Do you think schools/the government are doing enough to combat bullying or getting children involved in anti-bullying cultures, and are parents to blame?  Let us know.

Photo by Pimkie