The SSA suicide training program is facing backlash after leaked materials revealed staff were instructed to tell callers that suicide is “one option.”
As part of a massive workforce reassignment, the agency has moved IT, finance, and claims processing staff to the phones with only three hours of training. A core part of that instruction tells these unprepared workers to remind callers expressing a desire to end their lives that suicide is “one option.”
The specific guidance was delivered through an animated training video featuring a fictional employee named Fiona. In the video, the narrator explains the agency’s strategy for de-escalation: “It’s important for Fiona to keep the caller engaged and to remind her that suicide is only one option,” the animated trainer told employees in the video, “and that there is no urgency to make any decisions.” Workers who attended the Jan. 26 training session reportedly reacted with “disbelief,” with many immediately questioning their supervisors about the safety of such a script.
Outside experts are equally horrified, noting that the agency’s language contradicts decades of established suicide prevention protocols. Caitlin Thompson, a clinical psychologist and former national director of suicide prevention for the VA, slammed the phrasing as dangerous. “It’s not a normal thing to say,” Thompson said. “No. That’s not the thing you say to somebody who might be suicidal.” She stressed that staff should instead focus on immediate safety and professional handoffs to crisis hotlines rather than engaging in “unorthodox” philosophical discussions about options. “It’s a very specific thing to be able to talk to people,” Thompson added. “It can’t just be a ‘sorry to hear that.’”
While the SSA maintains that its agents are trained to be calm and compassionate, the National Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention warns that portraying suicide as an “acceptable” or “common” response can actually trigger imitation. A long-tenured crisis line expert echoed these concerns, calling the agency’s logic “odd” and risky for everyone involved. “If that is the one thing that they are being told to say, it puts the person on both sides in a potentially precarious situation,” they noted.
Despite the internal and external outcry, senior officials at the SSA are doubling down on the new protocols. When confronted with claims from workers that three hours of training is insufficient for handling life-or-death situations, one official dismissed the concerns entirely. “If there’s going to be this claim that individuals aren’t receiving the necessary training, I mean, it’s just not true,” the official said.
As reassigned workers continue to field increasingly complex calls, the gap between administrative phone duty and mental health crisis intervention remains a major point of contention.
