Suicide prevention is everyone’s business
Preventing suicide requires action well before a person reaches crisis, and support that continues when people, families and communities need it most.
During 2025-2026, MPHN continued to strengthen a whole-of-community approach to suicide prevention across the region. This meant investing in community connection and locally led prevention activities, building the confidence of people to recognise and respond to distress, creating more pathways into support following a suicide attempt, and strengthening support after a suicide loss.
Underpinning this work is a simple principle: suicide prevention cannot sit with the health sector alone. Communities, workplaces, schools, primary care providers, specialist services and people with lived and living experience all have a role in creating a more connected and responsive regional suicide prevention system.
Invested in community wellbeing and suicide prevention across the Murrumbidgee
Locally led community wellbeing and suicide prevention projects supported
People supported through 10,618 occasions of service delivered by Universal Aftercare
Participants reached through 73 group sessions, alongside 554 interventions and 807 occasions of service delivered through the After Suicide Support Program
People received capability-building, including 90 in Advanced Training in Suicide Prevention, 90 in Youth in Distress and 50 through MATES in Construction
Participating pharmacies reported increased confidence in identifying and responding to suicide risk
Strengthening the response after suicide
The Murrumbidgee Local Response Group (LRG) strengthened the region’s coordinated response for individuals, families and communities impacted by suicide during 2025-2026.
Bringing together five organisations working at the frontline of postvention, the LRG reviewed and updated the Murrumbidgee Suicide Postvention Communications and Response Protocol to support a consistent, coordinated regional response.
Importantly, the group also made its work more accessible to the community. A dedicated LRG webpage was developed explaining its role, membership and available supports, alongside a new community information flyer and Support After Suicide Loss flyer.
Together, these resources give people and communities affected by suicide a clearer place to turn for information and support when they need it most.
Communities help shape suicide prevention
New Suicide Prevention Community Collaboratives in Wagga Wagga and Griffith are creating another way for communities to help shape local responses to suicide prevention.
Commissioned by MPHN and delivered by Wellways, the two Collaboratives are designed to support a community-led approach, bringing local knowledge and perspectives into suicide prevention activity.
During 2025-2026, both Collaboratives focused on establishing the foundations for their work, including developing Terms of Reference and action plans to guide activity in the coming financial year.
The initiative reflects MPHN’s broader approach to suicide prevention: recognising that meaningful change requires communities to be part of identifying local needs and developing the responses that will work for them.
A shared roadmap for suicide prevention
The Murrumbidgee Suicide Prevention and Aftercare Collaborative (MSPAC) continued to bring together people with lived and living experience, service providers, government agencies and community stakeholders to strengthen the region’s coordinated approach to suicide prevention and aftercare.
A key achievement in 2025–26 was the development and endorsement of the MSPAC Priority Action Plan 2026-2028.
The plan provides a shared roadmap for collaborative action, aligning local priorities across prevention, intervention, aftercare and postvention and helping ensure activity remains informed by local needs and evidence.
By establishing common priorities for the next two years, the plan provides a framework for organisations and communities across the Murrumbidgee to work collectively towards a more connected and coordinated suicide prevention system.
