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July 22, 2022
Wellbeing and mental health platform, the Govox Sports Programme will provide its mental health and suicide prevention program completely free of charge to all 2,500 sports clubs in Hertfordshire, England for one year, equating to £1 million worth of support. The effort aims to tackle the increasing rates of poor mental health with new research showing that 1 in 6 members of sports clubs ‘feel that they need to speak to someone’ regarding their mental health or personal wellbeing.
Through a partnership with Herts Sports Partnership (HSP) players will receive actionable aids and resources and coaches, managers and leaders will receive tools to connect and offer the right wellbeing support. Govox was founded in 2018 by Richard Lucas, following the suicide of two young men within his rugby community. It’s now used by an array of organizations in 10 countries, from universities to financial services. The platform brings mental wellbeing to the forefront of organizational practices – particularly sports clubs and makes it easy to check in with individuals who may need support.
“If we want to confront suicide at the national level, intervention through sports clubs could be a key way of doing this. I can’t think of a better way of reaching such a large cross-section of people. The evidence suggests that, as a result of the last couple of years, there is a mental health pandemic around the corner, and we are already seeing our sports coaches and physical activity instructors finding themselves on the frontline for mental health-related issues – particularly around younger people,” said HSP Partnership Director, John O’Callaghan.
According to Govox data amongst the members of sports clubs across the UK, a fifth are not able to say they feel positive about the future, whilst 23% say they haven’t enjoyed themselves in the past week. Lucas believes that sports clubs are vital to tackling the issue of suicide and mental health problems.
“Suicide impacts all kinds of people, but the stats show very clearly that it disproportionately impacts men under the age of 50 – exactly the same demographic we see heavily represented in sports clubs across the UK. In addition, suicides amongst younger women, aged 18-24 are increasing, and this is a way to reach them too. By working with HSP, we’ll be able to offer tens of thousands of people mental health support. I’d welcome representatives from sports organizations across the country to get in touch so we can work together to tackle mental health and suicide,” he said.
The platform was developed in collaboration with King’s College London and NHSX, and is being delivered with the signposting support of suicide prevention charities including ANDYSMANCLUB, Mind In Mid Herts and The Jordan Legacy.
Last month, the organization also provided its mental health platform for free to 1,000 UK state secondary schools with the backing of Nadhim Zahawi MP, Education Secretary at the time to try and curb the increasing rates of teenage suicide.
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