Suicide in Australia

"Suicide in Australia: meta-analysis of rates and methods of suicide between 1988 and 2007" is the title of an article in the Medical Journal of Australia, by Olav Neilssen and Matthew Large this month. In 1997, there was a peak in the number of suicides in Australia, when 2720 deaths were classified as suicide. Over the next 10 years, the total number of suicides fell so that in 2007, 1880 deaths were classified as suicide. But although the number of deaths from suicide fell, the authors argue that this does not appear to be the result of a decline in suicidal ideation or rates of attempted suicide. They conclude that there has been a reduction in the availability of lethal methods, such as chemicals and firearms.