Last year, 3027 people ended their own lives in Australia, data released this week by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) shows.

It is the equivalent of one person every three hours, every day for 365 days.

But Lifeline Central West executive officer Alex Ferguson said he remains determined that suicide not be swept under the rug.

“Lifeline has called suicide a national emergency for the past year, and clearly it is, because largely suicide is preventable,” he said.

“It’s [suicide] nearly three times the national road toll and it’s climbing.”

Mr Ferguson may have worked for Lifeline for eight years, but he said the extraordinarily high number of suicides last year came as a terrible shock.

“It’s up 200 [suicides] year-on-year, and last year they were up 300 on the year before,” he said.

In 2015, suicide was the leading cause of death among all people aged 15-44 years, and the second leading cause of death among those aged 45-54.

The average age of someone dying by suicide is 44, compared with the median age of 82 for all deaths.

Deaths from intentional self-harm occur among males at a rate three times greater than that for females.

When asked why he thinks the number of deaths by suicide is so high, Mr Ferguson said the reasons are complex, but said stigma surrounding mental health issues is a major factor.

“Modern society is quite fragile,” he said. “It seems to me some people get offended very quickly.

“Bullying can be a very major issue, especially cyber bullying.

“All these things grind people down and when people are ground down, they tend not to be able to see the future.”

Mr Ferguson said stigma surrounding mental health works “against every component of the suicide debate”.

And, he claims that stigma goes all the way to the top of the Australian Government.

“Politicians and bureaucrats don't like talking about it, but they need to,” Mr Ferguson said.

He said the decision to take your life is deeply personal, and ABS data also shows that suicide accounts for one-third of deaths (33.9 per cent) among young people aged 15-24 years.

“We’re seeing a trend with young people that it’s [suicide] the first option, not the last option,” he said.

Environmental and political factors also impact a person's frame of mind such as flooding in Forbes and the proposed ban on greyhound racing, and both are wiping out people's livelihoods.

“People are the human component of the greyhound ban,” he said. “At the other end of that leash is a human being and policy has got to take all this into account.”

When asked if the numbers on suicide feel too big to tackle, Mr Ferguson said the answer is simple.

"It motivates me to work harder to get the message out,” he said.