Prison suicides, -10% in 2025: Nordio bets on school and culture

Among the data presented by the minister, ample space is devoted to educational pathways, which are also considered as indirect levers for the prevention of hardship. In 2025, 901 first-level school courses and 782 second-level courses were activated, with the total involvement of 19,391 inmates in educational pathways.

The figure is relevant not only for the quantity of courses activated, but for the audience reached: in prison, education is not a cultural 'optional'. It can become a daily garrison against emptiness, marginality and loss of perspective, elements that often add up to pre-existing disorders or personal crises linked to trials, convictions, family break-ups.

On the university front, access to higher education records 1,837 inmates enrolled, with 260 university departments involved and 437 degree courses active in prison institutions. It is an infrastructure that, in numbers, describes an extensive national network. However, one point remains decisive: the difference is made by the real continuity of the courses (timing, tools, tutoring, links with universities), not by the formal existence of the offer. But the political message today is that study is indicated as one of the components of the overall response to prison fragility.

Nordio also linked the issue of suicides to the strengthening of mental health protection, calling for inter-institutional collaboration to strengthen psychiatric services and manage the Residences for the Execution of Security Measures (REMS).

The updated picture given by the minister photographs the situation as of 7 November 2025: there are 675 people in the REMS, of whom 606 are men and 69 are women. This figure, read in the context of the prison debate, highlights a delicate point: the management of psychic distress cannot be offloaded onto the prison, but requires dedicated channels, clinical skills and adequate facilities. The REMS, in this sense, are an essential junction, even if historically burdened by critical issues of capacity and waiting times.

The 'mental health' element is probably the most sensitive with respect to the suicide issue: prevention also means ensuring timely diagnosis, care, therapeutic continuity and intervention in acute phases. If the network described by the Ministry holds on the territory and inside institutions, it is here that it should produce measurable effects.

"Minister I'll give you the numbers of prison overcrowding: at the end of November 2025 it is 63,868 people, +2000 compared to the previous year, against a capacity of 46,124 places, -700 compared to the beginning of the year. But what do you want to do with these numbers, in such a dramatic situation'. Iv MP Roberto Giachetti said this in the Chamber of Deputies, speaking to Minister Carlo Nordio. "How can you exclude that people who live like in pigsties do not go as far as committing suicide over something like this?" shouted Giachetti, still addressing the minister.