Cheyenne River Statistics
Children living in Cheyenne River, South Dakota, the 4th largest Indian reservation in the U.S. are challenged by having…
- the highest child poverty rate in the nation,
- 50% of the people living below the poverty line,
- an unemployment rate of 75-85%,
- aprox 10% of those employed working part-time
- and teen suicide rate that is 3.5 times the national average.
Articles – South Dakota Indian Youth Suicide
American Indian Youth in Crisis: Tribes Grapple With a Suicide Emergency
It feels like wartime,” says Diane Garreau, a child-welfare official on the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation, in South Dakota, speaking of the youth-suicide epidemic sweeping Indian country. “I’ll see one of our youngsters one day, then find out a couple of days later she’s gone. Our children are self-destructing.”
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Indian Reservation Reeling in Wave of Youth Suicides and Attempts
Tribal leaders at Rosebud took a survey of Todd County students in March. The students’ biggest complaint was that they did not feel safe for fear of gangs. They said that they had no refuge, that their parents were not present, and that they saw too much tragedy, alcoholism and hopelessness.
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Native Youth Killing Themselves
As Native-American languages become nearly extinct and many young Native-Americans don’t have a sense of their own history, the poverty and substance abuse issues multiply, Garreau said.
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Articles – South Dakota Foster Care System
Incentives And Cultural Bias Fuel Foster System
“It enrages me,” says Crow Creek tribal council member Peter Lengkeek. “We’re very tight-knit families and cousins are disappearing. Family members are disappearing.”
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South Dakota foster program raises concerns
“We found out that when the state of South Dakota seizes a Lakota child they were forced to take a mental health screening test. The screening test was drafted up by the Eli Lily Corporation which is a major manufacturer of psychotropic drugs. When they flunked the test, they were determined to be in need of one or more of these drugs”.
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Suicide Prevention Resource Center Fact Sheet
Suicide among Racial/Ethinic Populations in the U.S.
American Indians / Alaska Natives
“Spirituality: Commitment to tribal cultural spirituality (forms of spirituality deriving from traditions that predate European contact) is significantly associated with a reduction in suicide attempts. People with a high level of cultural spiritual orientation have a reduced prevalence of suicide compared with those with low levels of cultural spiritual orientation.”
23 Garroutte, E. M., Goldberg, J., Beals, J., Herrell, R., Manson, S. M., & the AI–SUPERPFP Team. (2003). Spirituality and attempted suicide among American Indians. Social Science & Medicine, 56(7), 1571–1579.
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