Young people are doing it for themselves in a bid to help combat Northern Ireland’s suicide epidemic. A group called Data, with members as young as 14, are reaching out to their peers — not just in Northern Ireland, but across the world.

The group, based at the Niamh Louise Foundation Protect Life resource centre in Dungannon, has found a powerful tool in helping save young lives through the internet.

In a bid to offer an effective alternative to controversial sites promoting suicide to youths, Data members have set up their own mentoring site through popular social networking vehicle Bebo.

And since the launch of www.bebo.com/data-and-the-donkey the teenagers have talked countless despairing kids from all over the world into getting medical help.

Set up in memory of their young friend Niamh Louise McKee from the Co Tyrone town, who tragically took her own life in 2005 at the age of 15, Data’s most effective weapon in the battle is its members.

“Because we are young ourselves we can relate to what young people who are in despair are going through and they can relate to us and talk to us,” said Data chairwoman Alana McKeever.

A founder member of the group, 18-year-old Alana explained how it got started.

“When Niamh died it was so out of the blue — she was the life and soul of everything and it was just so shocking and so hard to understand.

“At school everyone was crying, including the teachers, but it was two or three weeks later before it really started to kick in and you started to ask ‘why?’

“We found that no one could explain why, or help us understand why it had happened.

“Niamh’s mum Catherine had set up the foundation in her memory to help people come together and talk about their experiences of suicide, and so myself and Niamh’s boyfriend and another friend went along to it. We then decided in February 2006, on what would have been Niamh’s 16th birthday, to set up a youth group to provide information and help to young people.”

Initially Data was set up to reach out to kids in the local area, but the young people had tapped into something unique and it wasn’t long before they were contacted by others like themselves from throughout Tyrone, Armagh, Antrim and Down.

The group have been involved in numerous activities including major fundraisers, a ‘Candle of Light’ vigil in remembrance of suicide victims in their home town and training in suicide prevention.

But it was the setting up of their website a year ago that has had the biggest direct impact on helping young people on the verge of suicide.

Alana explained: “Because Niamh’s mum discovered — after she died — that she had been visiting websites promoting suicide, we felt that we needed to combat this on the internet and so decided to set up the Bebo site.

“Some of us completed the ASIST (Applied Suicide Intervention Skills) first aid course and about six or seven of us monitor the site.

“It’s been going about a year now and we’ve had 3,000 views on the page and there are currently 350 members.

“We are there to listen and can relate to what the young people visiting the site are saying, and so they find it easier to open up to us.

“In our age group we know where these young people are coming from and we understand the pressures they face.

“We have been talking to people from as far away as New Zealand and we know that many of them have gone onto get help after speaking to us.

“In the Dungannon area there have been so many recent suicides and it is very worrying, not just for parents but for young people.

“It leaves us worried about what is going through our friends’ minds.”

The young people have just completed a fundraising bed push from Dungannon to Coalisland, raising £1,800 for their campaign.

Their latest project is an awareness poster with information about Data and the Bebo

site, which they hope can be posted at youth centres and businessed across Northern Ireland in a bid to reach young people who need help.

Data will also be playing a part in two candlelight vigils in Cookstown and Armagh in December.

Added Alana: “It’s rewarding for all of us in Data to be able to help, but it’s not all work and no play.

“We have a lot of fun together —Data has a great social side to it and we’ve made some good friends.

“We hope that people will offer to take one of our posters so that we can help get the message out about the website and the group to as many young people in Northern Ireland as possible.

“We want them to know that there is help available and that they are not alone and that there are people who understand what they are going through.”

l If you would like to support the young people by displaying one the of their posters, you can contact them through the Niamh Louise Foundation on (028) 8772 6717.