China's Student Suicides Increase at New School Term

September is the start of a new semester in China and some cities are already reporting student suicides. Within the first two days of school, four suicides were reported in Shanghai. In Beijing, Tianjin, Guangdong, Hubei, and Sichuan Provinces, students also took their lives.

Mr. Zhang Chun from the Nanjing Suicide Rescue Hotline has already received suicide cases ranging from junior high through to college students.

[Zhang Chun, Rescue Hotline Operator for 995sos.com in Nanjing]:
"Children nowadays are under too much pressure from middle school to high school. They don't have much time to go out and experience being in society. They have no other way of learning, and have no way of blowing off steam. They don't have this kind of experience or knowledge. We have sex education, but we don't have love education, nor life counseling."

Another helpline counselor believes parental pressure is contributing to the suicides. With China’s one child policy, most children have two parents and four grandparents, who all want to see their offspring succeed.

[Miss Xue, Helpline Counselor]:
"Parental education is partly to blame as parents have high expectations of their child, but every child is born with different abilities, not everyone is the same."

In 2002 The World Health Organization (WHO) estimated that 30 million children under the age of 17 had behavioral and emotional problems. It went on to say that, although the rate was high, treatment for the problems was low.

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