[derbOac]

I think the point is, does removing fans make someone less depressed in the long run, or increase their quality of life?

If someone still wants to kill themselves, but cannot because all means have been eliminated, have you solved any problems?

I'm honestly not sure that I'd argue it doesn't increase quality of life, but using suicide prevention as an outcome seems superficial to me.

[GavinMcG]

Well you've solved the immediate problem of having zero further opportunity to solve the underlying problem (because they're dead).

One point made in the linked article is that identifying risk in individuals isn't something we've found a good way to do. If we know who needs help, helping them is better than removing a fan. But we usually don't know who needs help, despite a variety of sensible-seeming approaches to figuring it out.

There's still an argument that aside from the individual level, we should address things at the societal level: what socioeconomic forces contribute to people being in tough situations where suicide seems like the only way out, and how can we change those socioeconomic forces?

That's a great question and a great place to focus our energy. And, while we're working on changing the world in bigger ways, we can make it a safer place.