What if we knew domestic violence was a cause of suicide?

What if we could cut that in half tomorrow?

A new report by the NSW Domestic Violence Deaths Review team shows a connection between those who take their own lives and who have also experienced family violence as a victim, a perpetrator, even a witness. Just under 40 per cent of all the suicides in the study were known to police because of domestic violence. Nearly half and that proportion held true for men, who are mostly the perpetrators, and for women, who are mostly the victims.

This means those figures we see, where one woman a week dies at the hands of a partner or former partner, are rendered meaningless. It also means that of the more than 2800 suicides in Australia each year, about 800 have a history of family violence, if we extrapolate these NSW figures nationwide.

If we also imagine that of those 800, around 200 are women, that's four more lives per week added to the toll of one woman a week. Fifteen more lives are added per week in total, men and women, to the toll domestic violence has on Australia. Every week. I wonder if governments across our nation would consider that a national emergency?

An even more heartbreaking figure is that one in five women - and one in 10 men - who take their own lives had witnessed family violence when they were children.

It's here we could make a start to reduce our rates of suicide.

The Australian Children's Commissioner Megan Mitchell has spent two years investigating family violence and intentional self-harm and suicide by children and next week will present her findings at the Australasian Injury Prevention conference in Ballarat, which will detail exactly how we can make our communities and organisations safer for children. Suicide is the leading cause of death in children and teenagers and Mitchell's research shows an association between childhood exposure to family violence and self-harm and suicide in children. It's that research that provides a chilling backdrop to the work done by State Coroner Michael Barnes and his team at the NSW Coroner's Court. As one researcher told me, this work must be done to get governments to understand the way in which domestic violence is not "just one woman a week", not just the women who turn up at hospital every three hours with injuries.

It's also those who are left behind. It's the suicides. If we stop family violence, we will cut the rate of suicide.

I've interviewed Cathy Kezelman a number of times, during her time as head of the Adults Surviving Child Abuse and this week as president of Blue Knot. A few years back, she braved the John Laws show to explain to the radio presenter that he must rethink the way he talked about child sexual abuse. It's a testament to her knowledge and the way she conducts herself around these complex issues that Laws saw the error of his ways. On Monday, I asked her about the domestic violence deaths report. She says around 85 to 90 per cent of those who present with mental health issues have been exposed to some kind of childhood trauma.

"Sadly, there is a very strong relationship between people who felt repeatedly unsafe or were harmed because of abuse or violence as children and the struggle with suicidal thoughts and behaviours," she says.

For decades, researchers have searched for causes of suicide and this groundbreaking pilot research from the Domestic Violence Deaths Review team does not pretend to provide definitive answers or causation. But we must use this correlation to spark an urgent review of the way we treat family violence in this country. We can't wait for another COAG. We can't wait for any of our governments to make pronouncements. We need to ask those who research in the area for their highest priorities - and spend money on this right now.

Marc Bryant, Everymind suicide prevention program manager, has been working in the field for years and says suicidal behaviour and violence against women and their children are huge public health issues for the suicide prevention sector in Australia.

"Studies demonstrate the impact of family violence - and the link to an increase in prevalence of both psychological distress and suicidal behaviour to women and their children, as well as to the perpetrators of that violence," he says.

"This should be central to our universal and targeted suicide prevention efforts - those involved are young and old, and from many different cohorts in the community."

Megan Mitchell says that her research found that one child is killed by a parent each and every fortnight.

"Many young people are bystanders, witnesses and victims of family violence. In the more tragic cases, children can lose loved family members. Some children and young people feel so distressed by their exposure to family violence that they exhibit self-harm and suicidal thoughts.

"In the worst of cases, they become direct victims they take their own lives, or are injured or brutally murdered."

If we stop family violence, we will save lives - lives of men, women and children.

Jenna Price is an ACM columnist and an academic at the University of Technology Sydney. She received the Australian Injury Prevention Network's 2017 reporting fellowship.

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