One-third of Israeli suicides since 2000 involve immigrants

Approximately one-third of suicides in Israel between 2000 and 2013 were by immigrants, according to a report presented Wednesday to the Knesset’s Immigration and Absorption Committee.

Of the 4,806 suicides registered in that period, 1,658 (34.5 percent), were committed by immigrants aged 15 or older.

The study, prepared by the Knesset and Research and Information Center, noted that one-quarter of those who took their own lives in that period were immigrants from the former Soviet Union, while another 3-8% originally came from Ethiopia.

The Knesset discussion on Wednesday centered on the quality of current mental health care provided to new immigrants. Access to mental health care is now provided to patients through their health maintenance organization (HMO), following recent reforms.

Under the reforms, state subsidies for mental health care were reduced and employment at state mental health facilities frozen, a move that led to a complete halt in the recruitment of new mental health professionals.

Psychologists and social workers in the public sector are currently striking in protest of the reforms, which they say harm both carers and patients.

The Knesset committee chairman, Ethiopian-born Likud MK Avraham Nagusa, said while the reforms were intended to make care more accessible, it achieved the opposite in cases where patients needed short-term treatment.

“Many immigrants experience an immigration crisis, but are afraid to be labeled as having mental health problems,” Nagusa said. “Therefore they avoid treatment, in particular as they cannot afford the cost of private mental health care. According to the data [in the study], there are no translators in the HMOs, and immigrants face difficulties in receiving treatment following the reforms. The Health Ministry and HMOs must immediately recruit therapists who speak [foreign] languages.”

The Immigration and Absorption Ministry has in the past announced investment of NIS 5 million ($1.3 million) to fund 11 Amharic-speaking social workers in Health Ministry mental health clinics. But Health Ministry data shows that only nine have been employed, and they are employed on a part-time basis.

Zionist Union MK Ksenia Svetlova, herself an immigrant from the former Soviet Union, told the committee of the hardships involved in moving from one country to another. The move can be traumatic and take years, she said.

Joint (Arab) List MK Dov Khenin said immigrants were “the victims of this reform.”

Asher Rachamim, from the Israeli Trauma Center, linked the report to the National Insurance Institute’s poverty report, also published Wednesday.

“We should not ignore the fact that in every home there is at least one person in a complicated mental state. Families do not know how to deal with this, and those who can’t see the link between a mental state and conditions of poverty are missing a significant issue,” he said.