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Students Light the Flame of Awareness

Photo credit: Amber Burg
Photo credit: Amber Burg

By Amber Burg– Every 40 seconds someone in the world dies from suicide.

Morningside College students showed their support on Suicide Awareness and Prevention Day, September 10. At 8 p.m. tiny orange lights lit up the windows of the dorm all over campus.

Flameless candles were given out in the Olsen Student Center and in the lobbies of each dorm. The students placed the candles in their windows and left them aglow during the night.

Morningside wasn’t just the only place placing candles in their windows. The theme for this year’s Suicide Prevention Day was ‘One World Connected.’ All around the world people lit candles and placed them in their windows to show their support.

According to the International Association of Suicide Prevention, over 800,000 people die every year due to suicide. It leaves behind even more families, friends, and communities in grief over the lost of their loved ones.

Suicide claims more lives per year than war does. Throughout the whole world it is the second leading cause of death for people between the ages of 15 and 29 and the fifth leading cause for people between the age of 30 and 49.

If you know someone in need of help, reach out. Let this not be a one-day prevention but an everyday awareness. Keep the world connected in prevention and awareness.

September 12, 2014

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