The analogy was “don’t tell your kid not to stick crayons in their nose” - otherwise, well, they most certainly will latch on to the topic and do so.
Then how do you tell people that they can be helped about it without triggering the very thing?
The solution is to land on what you want your audience to do in the affirmative. For the pink elephant you can say, “Don’t think of a pink elephant: put your mental energy into imagining Mikey mouse riding a surf board.”
Similarly, here we can say something like “If you’re feeling suicidal, do x.” I’m not sure what x should be. Maybe call a hotline. I would have to think more about it, but the point is that landing on an affirmative action in this manner will offset the “pink elephant” effect.
An equally plausible explanation is that when the school had zero resources to help kids with depression or other mental health problems they choose to keep their mouths shut and suffer it in silence.
Once the school started paying attention to the issue, it started surfacing people with pre-existing problems who had not previously had anyone to talk to about it.
it's like asking on suicide hotline whether you have some weapon or object in room which could hurt you, great ideas to give to suicidal people...