The Samaritan organisation was established in the 1950's byReverend Chad Varan. He decided to form this organisation to be able to help people who were thinking of committing suicide. He believedthat if the people who wanted to kill themselves had a friend to talk to on the phone, they would probably decide not to commit suicide. People who work as Samaritans don't earn any money. They are volunteers. They are carefully selected and trained so that the highest standards of caring and befriending are achieved. A Samaritan has to be trained because he has to learn how to deal with a person who is in psychological distress since a person who wants to commit suicide cannot think clearly, feels lonely, left-out and hopeless. A Samaritan should know about how to put such a person at ease and make him change his mind. He ought to be able to persuade the person on the other end of the line that killing himself is not the only solution to his problem, that there are alternatives in life, and that life is worth living in spite of all the difficulties. They have to be very careful while talking to the people. They never indoctrinate them or preach at them; that is, they never tell them what they must or should do. In countries where the telephone is readily available, i.e., where finding a phone is not a problem, a telephone number which is easily remembered is advertised so that people who are likely to take their own lives can find someone to talk to easily. The Samaritans have developed a very careful publicity programme because they want the public to know that there are people who care and are ready to help them 24 hours a day. They want every person who is about to commit suicide to be able to contact them. In their publicity programmes they tell that the phone calls are always confidential. In other words, the phone calls are kept secret and the Samaritans will not tell other people about the calls and no one else, except for them, will know about the situation. This organisation has been very successful so far. Between 1983 and 1994, the suicide rate in England and Wales fell from 12 to 7 per 100,000.
