THE SUICIDE OF singer-actor Leslie Cheung Kwok-wing was one of Hong Kong's biggest shocks in a decade. The superstar left a single explanation for his final act in a suicide note: Depression.
He was not alone. Last year, 988 people took their own lives in Hong Kong and according to Suicide Prevention Services the rate has increased steadily since 1997.
But while Cheung's family has officially reiterated that depression was the cause of the superstar's death, public debate seems to have centred over whether the 46-year-old idol was ill or possessed by evil spirits, an indication of the unwillingness of many Hong Kong people to accept clinical depression as an illness.
'There's still a lot of stigma attached to mood disorders in Hong Kong,' says Eugenie Leung, a clinical psychologist with the Castle Peak Hospital. 'The minute people hear that, they immediately think, 'mentally ill', which makes a lot of people resist getting treatment - but it is getting better. More people are looking for treatment.
'But celebrities don't make very good patients because they are open to all kinds of therapies, even alternative medicine,' she adds. 'Every time you turn to this, you take a wrong turn. Patients need to have patience.'
Entertainment industry insiders say the increasing aggression of today's media intrudes on celebrities' privacy and makes it harder for stars to seek help for fear of being splashed across the city's front pages.
