Tania Sawicki Mead: UNICEF Aotearoa Director of Communications on New Zealand's child suicide rate

Signs of systemic failures when it comes to our children.  

UNICEF's Innocenti research reveals New Zealand's recorded the highest child suicide rate of 36 countries, and ranks last for mental wellbeing.  

It also finds we have one of the highest rates of child obesity and bullying.  

UNICEF Aotearoa's Tania Sawicki Mead told Ryan Bridge that although some of the decrease in life satisfaction can be attributed to the Covid-19 pandemic, it wasn’t the only factor. 

She says that the suicide rate didn’t shift significantly enough over the period pre- or post-Covid to make a dent in the statistics. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
So we've got a UNISEF report out and it's pretty
grim reading if you're talking about youth suicide in New
Zealand compared to the rest of the world, compared to
rich countries and the rest of the world anyway. So
what it says is, pre COVID we had a rate
of fourteen point nine per one hundred thousand people. This
is for fifteen to nineteen year olds. After COVID it
increased to seventeen point one, which means we were the

(00:23):
highest in the developed world and almost three times higher
than the average for high income countries. Tanya siwiky Meat
is from UNIICF with me this morning. Tanya, good morning,
good morning. What do you think pushed that up during COVID.

Speaker 2 (00:40):
Yeah, Look, what we did see is that across a
lot of the countries analyzed in this report that you said,
well the countries are we set e countries, there was
quite a significant decrease in life satisfaction for young people.
And you know, we could attribute some of that faciiti
in to the COVID pandemic, the disruption that that had
on everyone's lives, but particularly the disruption that it had

(01:01):
on young people's lives. So school being disrupted, routines being upended,
the uncertainty, the fear of the impact of that really
significant period of time. But for New Zealand, you know,
as you mentioned in your introduction, we have this really
staggeringly high suicide rate for young people when compared to

(01:21):
other countries, and that hasn't significantly shifted over the period
pre or post COVID enough to really make it then
in the horrific statistics that we have. So there are
many other factors I think going on there As to
White mu Zealands, use suicide rate remained so stubbornly high.

Speaker 1 (01:39):
And these numbers are just up to twenty twenty two, right,
but we have seen although we don't know for sure,
but potentially those numbers coming down over the last couple
of years.

Speaker 2 (01:50):
Yes, So how suicide reporting works is that there are
confirmed data. So that's where the coroner has confirmed that
our death was a suicide, and it takes quite a
while for that data essentially to catch up to the
present day. So what we have is confirmed data in
New Zealand for up to twenty twenty two, and this report,
because it's trying to compare like for like with all
these different countries, uses data that aggregates a little earlier

(02:13):
than that's more like up to twenty twenty one. And
so what we do see in New Zealand's our own
data that it collects on suicide is that there may
be some small improvements, but not enough to actually shift
the facts that we are still that massive outlie when
we compared to those other countries. It's still it may
be making small improvements, but it's still far too high, all.

Speaker 1 (02:35):
Right, Tanya, really appreciate your time this morning. Tanya Sowaki
made from UNI Set for more from earlier edition with
Ryan Bridge. Listen live to News Talks it Be from
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