Andy Le Seelleur made the comments after being shown a handwritten note given to one patient following a recent suicide attempt, which said simply ‘Listening Lounge’.
There was no further information, advice or telephone number for the counselling service or others, and Mr Le Seelleur said the case reminded him of the lack of care he believes his wife Monika received before she took her own life in 2016.
The campaigner, who founded Thrive Jersey which is developing a community-led suicide awareness and prevention initiative in collaboration with government and mental-health services, said multiple opportunities to help his wife were missed and he did not want the same to happen to others.
He is now due to meet officials from the Health Department and the family of the person involved in this case.
He said: ‘It has been a tough week, I was made aware of this and it really angered me, not just because it had comparisons with my wife’s situation, but because it seems there have been no lessons learned.
‘I’m not trying to be the enemy, I want to work with health officials and I am not tarring everyone with the same brush.
‘Some cases are dealt with well, but it is not good enough and it is out of order.’
He added: ‘I am sitting down with the family and then with Rob Sainsbury [managing director of Health and Community Services] to talk about these issues.
‘It does anger me. There was a mental-health review a few years ago which seems to have been a tick-box exercise.
‘But I am not going to tell people to get off the back of Health when this happens. Without a strong tone, Things won’t change.’
A tweet by Mr Le Seelleur showing the note has been forwarded to UK Health Minister Matt Hancock.
The incident comes after a Covid-19 strategy report last month revealed five people in Jersey had attempted to take their own life in recent months due to issues arising from the pandemic.
And Mr Le Seelleur said such shortcomings needed to be addressed immediately because there were even bigger mental-health challenges to come following Covid-19.
He added: ‘Things are wrong and I don’t want to bash people but sometimes you have to and have to take this tone.
‘I want to work with Health, which we are doing through the suicide alliance at the moment. On top of this, there is going to be a big mental-health problem coming into the future on the back of the virus.’
The Health Department has been approached for comment.
