Title: Worrying trends in U.S. suicide rates
Headings: Worrying trends in U.S. suicide rates
Feature
Worrying trends in U.S. suicide rates
Suicide trends: Looking for clues
Limiting legal means
A strategy for prevention

Content: Rates have increased more sharply since 2006. Suicide ranks as the fourth leading cause of death for people ages 35 to 54, and the second for 10- to 34-year-olds. It remains the 10th leading cause of death overall. But it’s a different story in other parts of the world. Over roughly the same period, other countries have seen rates fall, including Japan, China, Russia and most of Western Europe. What is going wrong on our shores—and what lessons can we import from elsewhere? Suicide trends: Looking for clues
Pinpointing the reasons that suicide rates rise or fall is challenging in part because the causes of suicide are complex. Risk factors include health factors (such as depression, substance use problems, serious mental illness and serious physical health conditions including pain), environmental factors (such as access to lethal means and stressful life events including divorce, unemployment, relationship problems or financial crisis) and historical factors (including previous suicide attempts, a family history of suicide and a history of childhood abuse or trauma). “At the individual level, there is never a single cause of suicide.