Opinion: Suicide among Alaska Native youth making news again

Tuesday, January 18, 2011  

"It was a story that begged to be told. It was 1987. That year, Anchorage Daily News editor Mike Doogan noted that an alarming number of obituaries were coming across his desk without listing a cause of death. That meant only one thing; these were victims of suicide. Self-inflicted deaths. And most of them were Alaska Native young people.

More compelling than numbers was the fact that no one seemed alarmed. People didn't talk about it. What was abnormal had become normal or so it seemed.

One day the newspaper announced that we would look into the voice vacuum to find out if there was anything there. Our task, as reporters, was simple; put a human face on suicide among Alaska Natives, and then perhaps, it would get people talking.

In roughly six months, 17 of us reporters and researchers uncovered what seemed like mountains of information. Sad and tragic stories. Many had a singular thread running through them -- that of alcohol and drug abuse.

The end result was a 10-day series called People In Peril. The work opened our eyes and brought the subject into the light of day. Slowly Alaska Native people began to dialogue among themselves and others. Soon, state and federal agencies and Native nonprofit organizations alike began to tackle the problem. Millions of dollars began to pour into the state and go to outlying regions. Hope was in the air.

The series won a Pulitzer Prize. That was more than 20 years ago."

Get the Story:
John Tetpon: Addressing suicide means new direction (The Anchorage Daily News 1/18)