Suicide Rate: US Saw 25% Increase Since 1999, CDC Says

[appalachiablue]

Source: CNN

Suicide rates increased by 25% across the United States over nearly two decades ending in 2016, according to research published Thursday by the CDC. Suicide rates increased by 25% across the United States over nearly two decades ending in 2016, according to research published Thursday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Twenty-five states experienced a rise in suicides by more than 30%, the government report finds.

More than half of those who died by suicide had not been diagnosed with a mental health condition, said Dr. Anne Schuchat, principal deputy director of the CDC.

"These findings are disturbing. Suicide is one of the top 10 causes of death in the US right now, and it's one of three causes that is actually increasing recently, so we do consider it a public health problem -- and something that is all around us," Schuchat said. The other two top 10 causes of death that are on the rise are Alzheimer's disease and drug overdoses, she noted.

In 2016 alone, about 45,000 lives were lost to suicide.

"Our data show that the problem is getting worse," Schuchat said...MORE...

Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/suicide-rate-us-saw-25percent-increase-since-1999-cdc-says/ar-AAylNWS

[7962]

1. I wonder how the US compares to the rest of the world??

And what the heck is going on? Meds? Lack of meds?

[John Fante]

5. This is important information. You know the fundies are

dying to blame this on the rise of secularism in this country.

[TimeSnowDemos]

6. It's not the best or the worst

48 out of 183, but it'll go a bit higher when the new figures are added.

In other words about 135 countries have a lower rate than we do.

[Kber]

7. Access to guns

They make an suicide attempt much more likely to be “successful “.

[former9thward]

19. There is not an increase in access to guns compared to 1999.

Just as easy or hard to get a gun in 2016 as it was in 1999.

[appalachiablue]

8. Per CDC, US: 54% did not have a known mental illness; lack of access to

affordable mental health services, financial and personal problems, gunshots, opioids, and more in today's CNN article.

* "Twenty-five states experienced a rise in suicides by more than 30%, the government report finds."
----------------

*WHO: Rankings, Charts, Data from the World Health Organization
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_rate



Male: Female ratios of suicide rates. Green means higher prevalence of male suicides. Below are the male and female standardised suicide rates used to derive the above ratios.[1]

[7962]

12. Well, I looked it up & Asia, Africa & Europe have a higher rate than "the Americas"

Wiki didnt break down the US out of "the Americas", but we're above and below some surprising names. To me, anyway.

[bucolic_frolic]

2. Hopelessness

People who are just pressing onward to earn the money to stay ahead of the bill collector, with no hope for fatter bottom lines or improvement. We are taught to consume and borrow, we consume and borrow. But I do think one can observe the constant money pressures in the blank grim stare on people's faces.

[TimeSnowDemos]

3. According to multiple studies

The single biggest way to reduce suicides is the remove access to guns.

As long as the US has 300,000,000+ guns its going to have 30,000+ suicides.

But try and find anyone in the US - aside from researchers and people in the mental health field - and you'll come up empty.

So the next time you argue for merely 'common sense' gun control, remember that you're really arguing for 10s and 10s of thousands of dead people, including 10s of thousands of suicide victims.

Because 'More than half of those who died by suicide had not been diagnosed with a mental health condition' so those people can happily get guns and kill themselves.

Common sense.

[sarisataka]

20. This point neglects the fact

That non gun related suicides are increasing at a virtually identical rate to suicide by firearm. Also by focusing solely on fire arms it begs the question how many non gun related suicides are acceptable?

I say this as a person who very recently lost a relative to suicide. His body was found with a gun however that appears to have been his backup plan. He did find an effective way to kill himself without using it.

[TimeSnowDemos]

21. Hard to believe...

...that anyone that really cares about those killing themselves without guns, which is a minority, doesn't care about the majority that does.

Suicide is a difficult problem, but it is exacerbated to much higher level than it need be, because Americans are obsessed with guns.

I'm sorry for your loss, genuinely, but look at the figures.

Most people that attempt suicide only attempt once, most try within minutes of deciding, the success rate for all methods except guns is about 10%, but with guns it's 90%.

When Israeli troops were killing themselves at an alarming rate the Israeli military simply took away their guns at the weekend, and the suicide numbers plummeted. Harvard medical school released a study about suicide and the author said that the number one way to lower rates would be to remove guns.

Fixing all the rest of the issues is extremely complicated and personal and requires study and support networks and even then, it often proves ineffective. What HAVE proven to be EXTREMELY effective is removing access to guns.

This is a forrest for the trees thing. Americans have lost the ability to see what's in front of their face when it comes to guns.

[Aristus]

4. It doesn't surprise me.

Since Election 2000, at least in my mind, the US has become more bitter, mean, petty, and vindictive. Americans seem to be less hopeful, less optimistic, less resilient, and more susceptible to fear-mongering.

We are working longer hours for less money and fewer benefits. Our elected officials exhibit a level of corruption that would make a mobbed-up Teamster blush. And they are relentlessly stripping our social safety net down to the bone, while ensuring that medical care becomes less and less accessible for more and more people.

The only thing really separating us from a failed state like Somalia is a lack of warlords in machine gun-equipped pickup trucks. And I'm sure we'll be seeing some of our own here before too long...

[jayschool2013]

9. We are a deeply unhappy country

Despite being the wealthiest country in the world, we are a deeply unhappy country with inadequate healthcare for too many of our people and too many guns in the hands of the wrong people.

In 2017, the U.S. had more than $62 trillion in wealth. China, the next wealthiest country, was worth just under $25 trillion. Our GINI wealth-inequality index is fourth in the world, however, behind only Turkey, Mexico and Chile.

We rank 108th out of 140 countries in the World Happiness Index.

Most major healthcare indices based on empirical research rank the U.S. between 30th and 40th in the world, despite our spending the most on healthcare.

We have nearly 113 guns for every 100 citizens. Add to that a growing sense of tribalism in the U.S. that pits citizens against each other, and you have a problem.

Now we learn that we turn those guns on ourselves more often than in any time in history.

Look to the happiest countries on earth, and see what we can borrow from them.* Which are they? Glad you asked:
1. Finland
2. Norway
3. Denmark
4. Iceland
5. Switzerland
6. The Netherlands
7. Canada
8. New Zealand
9. Sweden
10. Australia

*Hint: None of them have a populist know-nothing autocrat running their country, cutting healthcare and proposing that the citizens buy more firearms.

[7962]

10. Finland & Sweden have a higher suicide rate than the US.

But even seemingly happy people do commit suicide sometimes.

[herding cats]

22. Both Finland and Sweden have physician-assisted suicide.

I wonder if that skews their numbers?

[7962]

23. I would think they wouldn't include those, but its a good question.

[appalachiablue]

16. Thanks for posting this useful info., the reality & where the US stands.

The *US MIDDLE CLASS* has been declining steadily, once the world's largest. We dropped to No. 2 behind Canada, for the 1st time ever a few yrs. ago. The loss of a strong Middle Class is a very unhealthy sign = large, unequal lower class, small upper class.
_________

PEW RESEARCH CENTER, April 2017

1. The MIDDLE CLASS is large in many Western European countries, but it is losing ground in places.

A large majority of adults in the selected Western European countries live in middle-income households.
In 2010, the shares of adults who are middle income ranged from 64% in Spain to about 80% in Denmark, the Netherlands and Norway.
*These shares were considerably higher than in the U.S., where fewer than six-in-ten adults were middle income in 2010.
*Across the countries examined, a smaller middle-income tier signals a more economically divided population.*
*Among these countries, the U.S. has not only the smallest share of adults living in middle-income households, but also the largest shares of adults in lower- and upper-income households.*

By comparison, the lower- and upper-income tiers in Denmark, the Netherlands and Norway are of modest size.
*The size of the middle class in a country also signals the degree of income inequality there,*
*Countries with smaller middle classes have higher levels of income inequality.*
*Many countries in Western Europe have significantly larger middle classes than the U.S.*

The share of the adult population that lives in middle-income households varies considerably across Western Europe and the U.S. In 2010, the latest year for which data are available for all countries, the middle-income share was near 80% in Denmark, the Netherlands and Norway, the highest three among the countries examined, and as low as 59% in the U.S. Among the eight countries with data for 2013, the middle-income share ranged from 58% in the U.S. to 79% in Norway..MORE, http://www.pewglobal.org/2017/04/24/the-middle-class-is-large-in-many-western-european-countries-but-it-is-losing-ground-in-places/

[lagomorph777]

11. How much increase since November 2016?

I'll bet it's quite a spike.

[7962]

13. I think its energized MORE people than depressed them.

Everyone wants to vote him OUT

[lagomorph777]

15. I hope you're right.

It's been quite a struggle for me.

[BigmanPigman]

17. I have been wondering about those statistics

since the election too. Seems that more people are depressed and feel helpless since the fucking moron infected our country with his poisonous personality and policies.

[CrispyQ]

14. If we would provide economic security to all of our citizens,

it would go a long way to fixing our societal ills.

[YOHABLO]

18. We need more resources for helping people. Not more fucking F-22s and F-35s at over 150 mil a pop