Mental health crisis requires public intervention

Why do the same tragedies keep repeating in South Korea? This year alone, several beloved celebrities have taken their own lives. News of families dying by suicide has surfaced with alarming regularity. Each time such heartbreaking stories make headlines, the same question resurfaces: Why is our society allowing these preventable tragedies to continue?

Around this time every year, reports are released that serve as a barometer for the psychological state of South Koreans. Last month, Statistics Korea published its Quality of Life in Korea 2024 report. It showed that overall life satisfaction in 2023 dropped slightly to 6.4 out of 10. More troubling was the suicide rate: 27.3 per 100,000 people—the highest in nine years. While suicide rates across OECD countries have been declining, South Korea’s continues to rise. This has been a grim and persistent trend for over two decades.

Earlier this month, the World Happiness Report also released its global rankings. South Korea fell six spots to 58th out of 147 countries. Within the OECD, this ranks among the lowest.

Despite the worsening levels of life satisfaction and alarmingly high suicide rates, South Korea's approach to mental health remains dangerously complacent. Mental health professionals warn that the situation now qualifies as a "public health emergency," yet serious policy responses are still lacking.

Other advanced countries are responding much more proactively. According to the recently translated book Why Psychological Therapy Makes Economic Sense, the UK has been running the Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) program since 2008. This public initiative offers free cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and counseling services to those suffering from depression or anxiety disorders.

The UK government recognized that untreated mental illness leads to far greater societal costs than early intervention. Within just five years of launching IAPT, 400,000 people had received care—more than half of whom showed significant improvement. Outcomes extended beyond mental health to include gains in income, academic performance, and employment. In 2018, the U.K. went a step further by creating the world’s first Ministry of Loneliness to address mental distress and social isolation at a national level.

South Korea should pay close attention to this shift—viewing mental health not as a private issue but as a matter of public policy. Last year, the country launched a pilot program inspired by the U.K. model, called the “National Mental Health Investment Support Initiative.” However, this effort is still in its infancy.

In the U.K., the suicide rate stood at 8.4 per 100,000 people in 2021—well below the OECD average of 10.6. If ever there were a country in urgent need of a public, government-led intervention into mental health, it is South Korea, which continues to bear the shameful distinction of having the highest suicide rate among developed nations. It is time to break the cycle of tragedy with bold, evidence-based solutions. South Korea must look to international best practices and act swiftly before more lives are lost.