Suicide Statistics in Asians: Why Do People Kill Themselves?

A report by health officials in Beijing has found that China has one of the highest suicide rates in the world. More than a quarter of a million people a year are killing themselves - 685 a day. And 3.5 million make unsuccessful attempts. Suicide is now the primary cause of death among Chinese aged 20 to 35.

Chinese people are taking their own lives in record numbers. Recent statistics show that more than 287,000 people commit suicide on the Chinese mainland.

This amounts to a rate of 23 per 100,000 people, which is about twice as many than most Western countries. The report also found that the number of people taking their own lives in rural areas is three time higher than in the cities.

Besides, China is now the only country where suicide rates among women outnumber that of men - Of the total number who end their lives each year, 58 per cent of them are women. (suicide rates around the world are about three times higher for men than women).

Executive director of the group Human Rights in China, Sharon Om, has told reporter this is mainly due to the low socio economic status of women. "Those factors contribute to an increased vulnerability to abuse," she said. "In addition, the rural women have the additional stress that comes from being a families sole caretaker when the men leave to higher paid jobs in the city."

Currently, China only has 19 centres professional suicide intervention institutes which provide consultation to those contemplating suicide.

India

In some rural areas of India, more than twice as many young women aged 10 to 19 committed suicide as men in the same age group. Study found in those areas, the average suicide rate for women in that age group was 148 per 100,000, compared with 58 suicides per 100,000 men.

"There is a very major trend here. It could be because of lack of education, conflicts surrounding the issue of arranged marriages, love failures, dowries and things like that," said Dr. Lakshmi Vijayakumar, who runs the Sneha Suicide Prevention Center in Chennai, in the Madras region of India.

Once the women have children, they become emotionally and psychologically stronger and the suicide rate goes down.

Overall in India, male suicides start to outnumber the women as they get older, said Vijayakumar.

Sri Lanka

Between 1950 and 1995 suicide rates in Sri Lanka increased 8-fold to a peak of 47 per 100,000 in 1995. By 2005, rates had halved. The researchers investigated whether restrictions on the import and sales of the most highly toxic pesticides in 1995 and 1998 coincided with these reductions in suicide. They found that 19,800 fewer suicides occurred in 1996-2005 compared with 1986-95.

National and international policies restricting the pesticides that are most toxic to humans may have a major impact on world suicides. Other factors that affect suicide rates such as unemployment, alcohol misuse, divorce and war did not appear to be associated with these declines.

Suicide Methods

Pesticide ingestion is one of the leading suicide methods. Worldwide, an estimated three million cases of pesticide poisoning occur every year, resulting in an excess of 250 000 deaths. Pesticide self-poisoning is thought to account for an estimated 300,000 deaths in Asia – over a third of the world’s suicides.

One of the major differences between suicide in the West and in developing countries is the method. It is known from studies in the West that more women than men attempt suicide, but fewer succeed.

Usually, women in Western countries attempt suicide by slashing their wrists or swallowing pills, both methods that are treatable. In rural area of Asian countries, the methods are hanging, poisoning with lethal insecticides that are banned in many other parts of the world and setting oneself on fire. All three are difficult to survive.