‘It’s the People Doing It Themselves’: Community-Led Effort Aims To Prevent Suicide in Greenland

Kornelia Rungholm is one of over 500 people in Greenland who took a course to prevent suicide in their communities. The effort aims to save lives on an island with scarce mental health resources.

Content warning: This story includes discussion of suicide. If you or someone you know needs help, the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline in the U.S. is available by calling or texting 988. There is also an online chat at 988lifeline.org. The suicide and crisis helpline in Greenland can be reached at +299 80 11 80 or SMS: +299 1899.

QAQORTOQ, GREENLAND — Nearly everyone knows each other in Qaqortoq. 

Located 300 miles south of Nuuk, the crescent-shaped city can be seen in its entirety from the shore, with rows of colorful houses stacked across the grassy hillsides. In the warmer months, children are spotted bicycling down the narrow roads or dipping fishing lines into the water by the docks.

People shout "Kumoorn!" (good morning) to passersby.

It's a small town. With just around 3,000 people, most residents know who owns the single gas station and who works at the fish market down by the docks. 

And when someone dies by suicide, it's likely everyone knows them, too. 

It's like a cloud, some residents say. Greenland's high suicide rate hangs over them, yet no one really talks about it. Qaqortoq's lone therapist left for Greenland's capital years ago; the only professional help is the occasional counselor who pops in from larger cities at times to provide mental health services, usually after a suicide to prevent a domino effect of self-harm. 

Coupled with a culturally ingrained stigma, conversations surrounding mental health are typically few and far between.

But that is changing. And Kornelia Rungholm is among those leading the charge.

Rungholm, 30, has lived in Qaqortoq most of her life. She recalls her grandfather spending entire days hunting and fishing and her grandmother preparing "soul food" for a family feast when she was a child. Rungholm and her schoolmates would often hike into the nearby hills to pick crowberries, a type of blackberry.

But Rungholm remembers something darker, too. 

"When you live here, you have to be strong," Rungholm said softly, gazing out a window with a view of the hills. "You have to be delightful. You have to be kind." 

When you're struggling, she said, you keep it to yourself. In a small town like Qaqortoq, gossip can spread like wildfire.

But after losing three siblings to suicide, she said, she realized things couldn't go on the way that they were. She called her friend Arnârak Patricia Bloch, a suicide prevention instructor in Greenland who invited her to take a suicide prevention course in the fall of 2023. 

The course, which is entirely in Greenlandic, was created by Bloch to teach Inuit front-line workers—police officers, teachers, nurses, and public officials—conversation techniques and how to conduct suicide risk assessments to prevent suicide within their communities. Bloch has visited every municipality in Greenland and taught over 500 people.

Rungholm said the first class was hard for her. 

"I realized that I didn't ask directly if they had suicidal thoughts," Rungholm said of her siblings. "I never asked them because I was so afraid to know."

Since she completed the course, Rungholm has used every spare moment to answer texts and calls from people needing help. She scans social media to see if anyone posted about struggling with their mental health, and keeps her phone ringer on at night in case someone needs her.

She hopes to be there for others in the way she wishes someone was there for her siblings. When she answers calls or messages, she asks people how they are feeling and if she can check on them again soon. She asks if they're experiencing suicidal thoughts. She tells them they're not alone. 

And it seems to be helping.

In Qaqortoq and across Greenland, people are having more open conversations about mental health, Bloch said. One of her students in Qaanaaq—the northernmost town in Greenland—called her in 2022 and said that year, for the first time, there were no suicides in the town.

"It's not because we have increased psychiatrists or psychologists," Bloch said. Resources are still lacking; in some areas of Greenland, getting an appointment with a professional can take weeks, if not months. According to Bloch, "it's the people doing it themselves."

Life has changed a lot since Rungholm was a kid: The weather is unpredictable, making it difficult for elders to pass the traditions of hunting and fishing to younger generations and put "soul food" on the table. The berries Rungholm used to pick are now much harder to find. But the strength of the community remains the same.

On a sunny June afternoon, members of the community gathered in Rungholm's apartment for a kaffemik—a traditional open house—to celebrate her son's second birthday. 

Cartoon-truck paper cloths covered tables laden with "soul food," only this time bought from the grocery store down the road. Rungholm’s husband, Aleksander, washed dishes in the kitchen sink, translating some of the Greenlandic words shouted as children whizzed by on toy scooters and cars. “That means put it in its place,” he translated as one of the toddlers reluctantly moved his toy truck back into the patio corner. 

Rungholm, too, would share quick words as she refilled plates of food and ensured everyone was well taken care of, offering a tired smile. 

When the time came to sing happy birthday to her son, Tumi, Rungholm lit a candle on one of the cakes. Everyone stood around the toddler and sang in Greenlandic, a cheerful melody.

The candle was blown out and everyone cheered.

In two days Rungholm would take an exam to become a suicide prevention instructor like Bloch, allowing her to teach others in her community how to have safe conversations about mental health.

She still thinks of her siblings often, of all the lives so tragically lost to suicide. But she has hope, too.