Thembelihle Zwane
9 June 2026
Every day, roughly 23 South Africans take their own lives. Of those, an estimated 80% are men. In a country already grappling with soaring unemployment, rampant gender-based violence, and a chronically underfunded public health system, the mental health of men has become what experts are calling a quiet, lethal epidemic – one that society has been slow to confront.
June is Men’s Mental Health Month, a time dedicated to raising awareness about the unique pressures men face and dismantling the stigma that keeps so many from seeking help. But for thousands of South African families, awareness months arrive too late. The funerals have already happened.
South Africa’s suicide statistics are among the most alarming in the world. The country ranks 10th globally for suicide rates, with an estimated 23.5 deaths per 100,000 people annually – the third-highest rate on the African continent. According to the South African Depression and Anxiety Group (SADAG), men are four to five times more likely to die by suicide than women.
In 2019, of the 13,774 suicide deaths recorded in South Africa, 10,861, nearly 79%, were men. More recently, a 2025 report from the Journal of Men’s Health estimated that approximately 450 men take their own lives in South Africa every single month.
For men aged 41 to 60, the picture is equally grim. According to Discovery Life’s 2024 Claims Experience Report, suicide accounted for 35% of all unnatural death claims, outpacing road accidents, crime, and trauma combined.
“More people are struggling with mental illness, and some of them are more severe: depression, anxiety, psychotic disorders or substance-use disorders,” said Zamo Mbele, a clinical psychologist, speaking to the Mail & Guardian earlier this year. “There still is, unfortunately, too little care, and there’s stigma around, so people aren’t presenting themselves.”
At the heart of this crisis lies a deeply entrenched cultural expectation: that men do not break down. They provide. They endure. They do not cry.
From early childhood, South African boys are socialised into a narrow definition of manhood – one that prizes stoicism and equates emotional expression with weakness. Mental health professionals say this conditioning is costing lives.
“Men are taught from a young age to ‘man up’, to suppress vulnerability, and to avoid appearing weak,” said Dr Gagu Matsebula of the South African Society of Psychiatrists (SASOP). “Those expectations can become one of the biggest obstacles preventing men from seeking support when they need it most.”
Jaco van Schalkwyk, founder and CEO of The Character Company, a non-profit that works with fatherless boys across South Africa, argues that the problem starts even before adolescence. “There’s a chronic lack of emotional well-being among the country’s boys and men,” he said. “We don’t give boys the opportunities they need to explore and express their emotions in healthy ways. We don’t expect them to develop kindness and empathy. Vulnerability in boys and men is not accepted, and we lack safe spaces for them to tackle and process normal human emotions like fear, grief and sadness.”
Without those safe spaces, he warns, boys become men who cannot cope. “This crisis is also evident in the high rates of crime and violence, gender-based violence, and in the epidemic of substance abuse disorders across South African communities.”
For many men, the fracture point comes when life fails to conform to the role they were raised to play. Unemployment, currently sitting at around 33% according to Statistics South Africa, is one of the most devastating triggers.
Ronny Zondi, a former professional footballer, knows this intimately. After losing his career, his sense of self began to unravel. “Our socialisation as men, especially South African black men, we are socialised to provide for our family, and not being able to do all the things men are supposed to do sort of puts you in a very difficult situation,” Ronny has said. “I felt like it was challenging my manhood. I had to depend on my wife for things, and that did not sit well with me.”
The spiral was quiet and internal. “All of these things started playing on my mind and it put me in a dark space where I started withdrawing. I pulled away from my wife. I did not open up. My self-esteem was not good. My self-confidence went down.”
Eventually, he stopped seeing a future for himself. “I did not see a way out of my situation. A whole lot of fear crept in and I did not see a future for myself.”
Ronny’s doctor recognised what was happening and recommended he admit himself to a mental health facility. It was a turning point.
“On the day I was admitted, I saw that there were other men there, and in my mind it sort of put me at ease. I realised I am not alone.”
Today, Ronny openly shares his story, working with other men to break the silence. “I realised that it’s okay to be vulnerable as a man. It’s okay to cry, and it’s okay to ask for help.”
Part of what makes this crisis so difficult to address is that male depression often looks nothing like the textbook picture. While sadness and tearfulness are commonly associated with depression, men are more likely to present with irritability, sudden anger, risk-taking behaviour, and aggression, symptoms that are frequently misread or dismissed.
“The symptoms of depression and anxiety are not in keeping with the perception men have of masculinity,” noted Dr Talatala from the South African Society of Psychiatrists. As a result, depression frequently goes undiagnosed in men, and untreated depression, experts warn, is a direct pathway to suicide.
Clinical psychologist and researcher Anele Siswana has pointed out that understanding men’s mental health requires grappling with toxic masculinity not as a buzzword, but as a social construct with real and deadly consequences. “Toxic masculinity is a social construct that draws from different aspects or lenses,” Siswana explained. “But not all men who have depression or attempt or die by suicide are toxic.” The problem, he stresses, is the expectation placed on all men to perform emotional invulnerability regardless of circumstance.
Access to mental health services in South Africa remains deeply unequal. Psychologist Dr Mike West has described the treatment gap as staggering: an estimated 75% of South Africans who need mental health care do not receive it.
“Among rural South Africans, a staggering 67% have experienced a traumatic event. So how do we even measure the impact of that on the country?” Dr West said.
The public health system offers limited psychiatric resources, and private therapy is unaffordable for most. Men, who are already less inclined to seek help, are thus doubly disadvantaged: conditioned not to ask, and left with nowhere to go when they do.
According to psychiatrist Dr Shaheen Kader, part of the tragedy is that those who are most severely affected are often the best at hiding it. “The lack of clinical attention that depression sometimes receives is what results in suicide. Individuals who most need treatment are also the best at masking their depression.”
Experts agree that reversing these trends will require more than awareness campaigns. It demands a fundamental reshaping of how South African society raises boys and supports men.
Mental health professionals are also calling for better integration of mental health services into schools and workplaces, as Zamo Mbele noted: “Insufficient mental health services in schools and the corporate working environment are driving up mental illnesses.”
The SA Federation for Mental Health (SAFMH) and the South African Society of Psychiatrists (SASOP) have both identified men’s mental health as a priority area requiring dedicated policy attention and culturally sensitive care, services that acknowledge the specific ways South African men, particularly Black men, experience and express distress.
Men’s Mental Health Month in June is an important moment. But the experts, the survivors, and the bereaved families all agree: awareness alone is not enough.
For Ronny Zondi, the message is simple and urgent. “I realised that it’s okay to be vulnerable as a man. It’s okay to cry, and it’s okay to ask for help.”
In a country where a man takes his life every few hours, that simple realisation could mean everything.
If you or someone you know is struggling, contact the SADAG Suicide Crisis Line on 0800 567 567 (free, 24/7, available in all 11 official languages) or SMS 31393
