Each year, more than 700 000 people end their own life – each death a tragedy, with far-reaching impact on families, friends and communities. Much can be done to prevent suicide at the individual, community and national levels. LIVE LIFE is a WHO initiative to support countries to advance political will, national strategic action, and serve as a catalyst for governments to take evidence-based action to prevent suicide. By implementing LIVE LIFE evidence-based interventions for suicide prevention and underlying cross-cutting pillars, many lives could be saved.

The LIVE LIFE implementation guide, developed as part of this initiative, provides technical guidance for the delivery of four key effective and evidence-based multisectoral interventions and six cross-cutting foundational pillars for suicide prevention.

The WHO LIVE LIFE interventions are:

Limiting access to the means of suicide

Interacting with media for responsible reporting of suicide

Fostering socio-emotional life-skills in young people

Early identification and support to everyone affected by suicide and self-harm

The implementation of these interventions is supported by the following cross-cutting pillars:

• situation analysis
• multisectoral collaboration
• awareness raising and advocacy
• capacity building
• financing
• surveillance, monitoring and evaluation

The LIVE LIFE interventions can be integrated into health, community and other settings, and function as a starting point to build a multi-level, multi-sectoral approach to suicide prevention.