Mother Sharon Garton, from Mansfield, pleaded for more to be done to help veterans deal with mental health issues, telling the Mirror: 'Please don't let my son's death be for nothing.' She said tours of Afghanistan and Iraq had left her son traumatised and that he experienced 'lots of ups and downs'. The wife of Corporal Jonny Cole, who made a number of suicide attempts before succeeding in 2019, accused the Army of 'abandoning' her husband and his family when his mental health deteriorated as a result of combat trauma. Their inquests examined the mental impact on soldiers returning from the Afghan 'hellhole' to remote barracks in County Down. An estimated 250 military personnel and veterans have taken their own lives since 2017, more than the 179 soldiers killed while serving in Iraq.

Source: Daily Mail May 30, 2021 12:01 UTC