Global crew change crisis: suicides going uncounted
The Australian maritime regulator notes that suicides related to the crew change crisis are going uncounted in casualty reports.
By Michael McGrady, Maritime Direct Americas & Pacific Correspondent
The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) said that increasing numbers of stranded seafarers committing suicide should cause concern for the international community.
Lloyd’s List reports that there is no central database tracking these numbers, so nobody knows for sure if this is the truth.
Because of this, AMSA wants to amend the internationally-signed Maritime Labour Convention to mandate that reporting of man-overboard and suicide incidents should be reported to the International Labour Organization.
Michelle Grech, an AMSA vessel operations manager, told Lloyd’s List there was no international data set to record all death instances at sea.
To do this, flag states and national ship registries need to report “operational-related fatalities” to the International Maritime Organization.
That’s the standard, currently, but there are no mandates to attribute these to medical events, natural cases, man-overboard incidents, and suicides.
