To detect danger signals quickly that could lead to suicide, including depression, and provide treatment, mental health checkups will be conducted every two years like physical health checkups.

The government finalized the “Firth Suicide Prevention Basic Plan (2023-2027) at a meeting of the Suicide Prevention Policy Committee presided over by Prime Minister Han Duck-soo on Friday.

Among the conclusion of the meeting, medicine-related contents included the shortening of the mental health checkup cycle to cope with mental health problems preemptively, expanding the target diseases, and strengthening post de facto management, all of which can be summed up by expanding and revising the mental health checkup system.

Accordingly, the checkup cycle will be shortened from 10 to two years, and the target disease list will add schizophrenia and manic-depression disorders to the existing depression. In addition, after the checkup, the government will strengthen follow-up management through the combined efforts of mental health welfare centers and hospitals’ psychiatric departments.

from checkups, the government will also step up treating and managing mental diseases. For example, it will find out mental health risk groups among patients who use non-mental primary medical institutions, link them to specialized institutions, such as psychiatric departments or mental health welfare centers, and support treatment costs for suicide attempters and the bereaved families of suicide.

The government will provide medical expenses for physical damage, psychiatric treatment expenses, and psychological counseling expenses incurred in suicide attempts.

Also, it will designate new suicide methods, such as sedatives and sleeping pills, as suicidal objects and criminalize their sales, use, and distribution of information to induce suicide. If the risk of suicide is clear, the government will strengthen management with the emergency rescue.

Korea has recorded the world’s highest suicide rate for years.