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Crisis: what to do right now

The numbers for each country, what happens when you call, how to help someone else, and how to make a plan while you are well.

This is a map of how the systems work, not a diagnosis and not a treatment plan. It names no practice and no private price, because neither can be kept accurate here. It cannot tell you what is wrong or which treatment you need — that is a clinician's job, and it starts with an appointment. Never stop or change a prescribed medicine on the strength of a web page. If someone's life is in danger right now, call the emergency number: 112 anywhere in the EU and EEA.

If someone’s life is in immediate danger

Call the emergency number. In every country covered here that is 112, and Norway and Latvia also use a direct ambulance number — 113 in both. Do not wait to be sure, do not try to establish whether it is serious enough, and do not leave the person alone to go and find out. If there are means of self-harm within reach, remove them if it is safe to do so. If you are with someone who has taken an overdose, call now even if they seem fine, because many overdoses have a delay between the act and the damage, and the treatment window closes during it.

What a crisis line is for

A crisis or emotional-support line is answered by a trained person, usually anonymously, and its purpose is the hours nothing else covers. It is not an assessment service and it will not diagnose you or refer you, but it will stay on the line, and the evidence for talking to someone at the moment of highest risk is not controversial. You do not need to be actively suicidal to call — the lines exist for distress, and calling early is the intended use rather than an imposition. Several of the lines listed here also run chat, which for a lot of people is easier than speaking.

The 116 numbers, and why they look familiar

The numbers beginning 116 are reserved across the European Union and the European Economic Area for services of social value, by a Commission decision of 2007 that was extended in 2009 to add 116 006 for victims of crime and 116 123 for emotional support. That is why 116 111 is a child helpline in country after country: the number is reserved everywhere, and each country decides whether to assign it and to whom. It also explains the gaps — a reserved number that a country has not assigned simply does not connect there. Each country row below lists only the lines that country actually operates.

What happens if you go to emergency care

Turning up at an emergency department or a psychiatric emergency service in a mental-health crisis is a legitimate use of it. Expect a wait, expect to be triaged, and expect to tell the story more than once — bring a written note of your medicines and your history, because it shortens all of that. Most people who attend are assessed and go home with a plan the same day. Compulsory admission exists in every country here and is governed by strict legal criteria centred on serious risk, with rights of review; it is far rarer than the fear of it, and the fear of it keeps people away from help far more often than the reality catches them.

Helping someone else

Ask directly. "Are you thinking about killing yourself" is the question people are most afraid to ask and the one that helps most; the research is consistent that asking does not plant the idea. Then listen without arguing them out of it, which does not work and ends the conversation. Reduce access to means where you can — medicines, weapons, keys — because a great deal of suicidal crisis is short-lived and access at the wrong moment is what turns a crisis into a death. Do not promise secrecy you cannot keep. Do not leave someone at high risk alone. Get help alongside them rather than instead of them, and, if they refuse everything, call a crisis line yourself: those lines take calls from worried friends and family too.

A plan made while you are well

The most effective thing a person with a recurring condition can do is write a short safety plan on a good day, when thinking is clear, and keep it somewhere reachable. Six lines is enough: the signs that things are turning; what has helped before; who to contact, with the actual numbers; what to remove from the flat; the professional service to call and its hours; and the emergency number. Give a copy to one person you trust. In a crisis the plan does the thinking you cannot do, and this is exactly the sort of thing worth keeping written down and dated rather than held in your head.

Every line, by country

Sources: Commission Decision 2007/116/EC reserving the 116 numbering range · Commission Decision 2009/884/EC adding 116 006 and 116 123 · MIELI Mental Health Finland — crisis phone · Livslinien (Denmark) · Mental Helse (Norway) · Skalbes crisis centre (Latvia) · Lasteabi (Estonia) · Rules, entitlements and helpline numbers change: check the operator's own page before you rely on one. Checked 2026-09-08.

Frequently asked questions

Crisis and when it goes wrong

How this works where you live

Every rule on this page is filtered through one country's system before it reaches you. The country pages carry the doors, the registers and the numbers.

Estonia · Finland · Latvia · Lithuania · Sweden · Norway · Denmark