Bristol Sport teams up with suicide prevention charity Ripple

Bristol Sport has announced a new partnership with suicide prevention charity R;pple.

The UK-based charity provides immediate to support to people who search online for harmful content retaled to suicide and self-harm.

Under the agreement, the R;pple tool will be adopted by Championship club Bristol City, Premiership Rugby outfit Bristol Bears, and Super League Basketball team Bristol Flyers.

The R;pple tool, which can be downloaded as a browser extension or added onto WiFi networks, intervenes after online searches on topics such as self-harm and suicide.

The three clubs will each deploy R;pple across their websites in order to safeguard players from harmful content.

Users will then subsequently be guided through a series of breathing exercises, and will be guided to free, 24/7 helplines and mental health resources.

R;pple has intercepted more than 60,000 harmful online searches since the charity first launched, and has been downloaded more than 1.9 million times.

During Bristol City’s match against Sheffield United on Tuesday evening, a talk was delivered at half-time, explaining R;pple to fans.

Alice Hendy MBE, Founder and CEO of R;pple, said, “I’m absolutely over the moon to say that Bristol Sport and its clubs have partnered with R;pple as we continue to encourage fans to open up about their mental health.

“This is far more than a partnership for us, it’s an affiliation that is saving lives, and we couldn’t be more grateful to Bristol Sport for being so welcoming and helping us to shine a light on this crucially important topic.”

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