Aussie youth suicide rate highest in 10 years: study

The youth suicide rate in Australia is at its highest in a decade, a study has revealed.

The report, released by mental health service Orygen on Wednesday, said that the system is not working and a new suicide prevention strategy is needed.

Orygen, which is based in Melbourne, found that a third of all deaths of young men in the last 10 years were due to suicide.

The report said that 41,000 Australian people aged 12 to 17 years have made a suicide attempt in their life and that the suicide rate for women aged 15 to 19 has doubled since 2005.

Jo Robinson, head of Orygen's suicide prevention research, said that the current system was "clearly not getting things right."

"We really lack national leadership when it comes to youth suicide prevention," Robinson said.

"So despite a lot of investment, despite a lot of talk at government level... we really need a reinvigorated approach to youth suicide prevention."

While the suicide rate amongst young women doubled, the report said that the suicide rate among young men was still higher.

It also said that youth suicides were twice as likely to happen in clusters than adult suicides and that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander youth were most at risk of suicide.

In one cluster highlighted by the report, 21 young people took their own lives in a remote town in Queensland between 2010 and 2012.

In another, 15 young people died from suicide in a remote town in Western Australia in the same time period.

"We need to be very mindful that when there has been a suicide death by a young person, those young people around the death will be vulnerable to suicide going forward," Robinson told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation on Wednesday. Endit