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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples experience greater mortality rates than other Australians with significant grieving compounded by multiple losses and funeral attendance. A one year South Australian research project shows how workplaces can be culturally safe and supportive.
If anyone wants a justification for the relevance of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy outside old Parliament House in Canberra, celebrating its 40th year on 26 January, Tauto Sansbury's article "Eight funerals in 13 days" is one to read. Sansbury describes how on 13 January this year, he attended his eighth funeral of 2012, the funeral of a young man who suicided at the age of 21. All eight of the deaths were premature, with three suicides and another violent.
Each of these deaths brings feelings of grief and loss to a number of family members and friends and is a reminder of the disparity in life expectancy between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians of between 10 and 12 years. Whereas deaths of non-Indigenous Australians occur predominantly in older age groups, deaths of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians are more widely spread across all age groups with significantly higher proportions of infants, young and middle aged people than for non-Indigenous Australians. Indigenous children under five die at three times the rate of non-Indigenous children (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2009).
The consequence of these statistics is death is such a common occurrence: some Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples attend several funerals a week and, in their communities 'grief is continual and generational' (Hanson 2005, p2j. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare found 'Indigenous Australians were twice as likely as non-Indigenous Australians to report high/very high levels of psychological distress (27% compared with 13%)' (Al H W 2009). A major stress event reported was the death of a family member or close friend: 42% of respondents indicated they had experienced such a death within the past year (Al H W 2009).
Research study
This tragic reality motivated Aboriginal beginning researchers studying for the Certificate IV in Indigenous Research Capacity Building delivered through the Aboriginal Health Council of South Australia (AHCSA) to investigate grief and loss in Aboriginal communities and come up with ideas for how workplaces could be better equipped to support Aboriginal staff during bereavement.