Introduction

Speaker 1
Now, I would like to ask you a question? Has anyone here fallen sick before? Of course, the
answer is Yes, right? I would like to share with you a story of my good friend, who suffered from
a sickness, not physically but mentally.
Before that, a very good afternoon I bid to our honourable panel of judges and members of the
floor. To begin, my friend shows symptoms which she loses interest in doing things, she becomes
anti-social and feels like not more self-worth investing herself again. This is because of her
mother. Her mother always blames and compares her with other child who is better than her
when she did not get the marks that were targeted by her mother. Until one day, she started
skipping school and locked herself in the room. She felt as if no one care about her in this world.
The mental illness that she suffered is considered as depression. Depression is one of the theme
of public health. Depression is the feeling of emptiness, sadness and inability to feel pleasure for
no apparent reason. There are 3 types of depression, which is mild, moderate and severe. Luckily
for her, her mother realized her weird behaviours earlier and brought her to the hospital for
further treatment and saved her from committing suicide. However, not all people are very lucky
as my friend, some of them may already committed suicide to end their lives. And this is a topic
that we are going to tackle today which is “Depression among teenagers which leads to suicide”.
Depression is very common among teenagers. This fact can be proven by the research that was
carried out by NHMS between year 2012 until year 2022.We can see that the rates of depression
has increased among these ten years. The rate of suicide thought also increases from 7.9% in
year 2012 to 13.1% in year 2022. The data is skyrocketing increases so, we must take some
actions to address it. First, we have to know the exact factors that causes depression among the
teenagers.
The first factor that I am going to talk about is peer problem.
Peer problem
Peer is the second closest person with the teens as they spend most of their time with their
friends at school. However, a negative behaviour from peer friend will cause depression. They
rarely give you any support and all they want to see is your weaknesses. After that, they always
play jokes on your weaknesses. After they had made you mad, they would just saying “it was just
a joke, why do you take it so serious?” They do not even know that this kind of joke already hurt
their friend’s pride. This will make them become less self-confidence, feeling anxiety and
depressed. Less self-confidence can lead to poor academic performance, distancing from family
members and friends. Left untreated, this could eventually lead teens to engage in self harm or
have suicidal thought. This is because they think they are useless and feel like it’s not worth
investing yourself again. Besides, if they do not been diagnosed early and followed by the
treatment, they might commit suicide.
Speaker 2
SOCIAL MEDIA
Now, I will continue with the next factor. The second factor that I will touch is social media. In
this modern era, social media has spread widely. Its usage is not limited to age. All ages are free
to use social media. I admit that social media can be a positive thing. Most teen use social media
to communicate and it helps bring people together, share aspects of themselves and stay in touch
with family and friends. However, for teenagers, social media can also give a negative influence
such as cyberbully. It may be hard to fathom how some words or text on a computer screen can
lead to such trauma. At this moment, there is no teachers or parents who are going to see what is
happening and intervene to put a stop to it. It’s just like, there is no one will going to say “hey!
stop it and don’t listen to others”. I am definitely sure they will not say it, it’s just you and
yourself are going to face the problems alone. Here, the child may already experiencing feeling
of depression or anxiety due to problem at social media. This change of behaviour seems a bit
extreme such as “thoughts of suicide” .We should know that the relationship between bullying
and suicide is a strong one.

ACADEMIC PRESSURE
Last but not least, other than peer problem and social media, academic pressure is also one of
the factors that causes depression which could lead to suicide. Academic pressure is defined as
an experience in which a student is burdened by the demands of time and energy to achieve
specific academic goals. For example, students must get straight A's in SPM or 4 flat in STPM.
The stress actually can come from a variety of potential sources and has a myriad of impacts on
students both emotionally and academically. Listen here everyone, we have to bear in mind that
academic pressure does not always lead to better grades and improved test scored even though
we are forcing certain students to work hard on it. As the saying goes, “working smarter not
harder”. If this keep on continues, this will effect an adolescent to experience emotional or
physical symptoms of depression. And if we do not take it seriously, it may harm the student and
even worst, could lead to “suicide”.
Speaker 3

WAYS TO OVERCOME DEPRESSION

EAT HEALTHY FOOD AND DRINK PLENTY OF WATER
Do you know some people with depression do not feel much like eating or some may overeat.
But for your information what you eat can affect your mood and energy. So, we need to choose
the right food. For most people that means plenty of fruits, vegetables and whole grains. Try to
limit simple carb or food that added sugar like junk food or desserts. Do not go for too long
without eating. Even if you do not feel hungry try to take light and healthy meal. Also do not
forget to drink plenty of water to keep you stay hydrated because water carries nutrients and
oxygen to all cells in the body and avoid sugary and caffeinated drink when possible.
DON’T DWELL ON PROBLEMS TOO MUCH
It is a good thing to talk about your problem with your trusted person. However this can lead to
complain, blame and rehash problems too much. This is because we keep focusing on talking our
problems until it empower our personality. We all agree that it is totally fine to express yourself
but please talk about some positive things too so it can heal our mind and our heart into more
brightest side.
CUT BACK ON SOCIAL MEDIA TIME
It is a general knowledge that the increase of social media usage can contribute to depression and
low self-esteem since it can be addicted. However limiting social media can prevent us from
depression. You can do this by deleting any social media apps that disturb your quality time.
DO SOMETHING CREATIVE
Creative activities can also promote positive mental health outcomes if you enjoy being creative.
For instance, participating in dance, music, painting, theater can also serve as ways to express
yourself.
CONCLUSION
In a nut shell, depression is a very serious public health problem and now it seems to be high
occurrence among teenagers. We have to raise the awareness among our community as the
prevalence of mental disorder has significantly increased over time. In this fast moving modern
epoch, competence among each other are very high.
With that I end my speech. Thank you for lending us your ears.