Demographic characteristics of suicides in Sri Lanka from 2006 to 2018

Abstract

Suicides are a burning issue in most developing countries and the World Health Organization (WHO) reveals that approximately one person dies every 40 seconds owing to suicides (WHO, 2015). It is recorded that the low- and middle-income countries in the WHO's South-East Asian region account for 39.1% of suicides around the world despite 25.9% of the population in the world (Knipe et al., 2017). According to World Population Review website Sri Lanka is also in a leading position in the country list, being the 29th rank according to suicides and suicide rate is 14.6 suicides per 100 000 in 2019. Suicide incidence was 6.9 in 1995 and increased up to 18.9 in 2011 per 100 000 population in Sri Lanka (Warushahennadi, 2017). Since suicides are the 3rd leading cause of death among adolescents in the world (Warushahennadi, 2017), researches are being carried out to find out means to prevent them. However, it is questionable, how far attention is paid on the suicide rates of other age categories such as elderly population. According to the suicide death rate of Sri Lanka in 2006, elderly suicides are higher in the composition (WHO, 2017) and it emphasizes the importance of further research to examine the entire age profiles and other demographic characteristics to further understand the severity of this problem. Also the study of demographic characteristics would provide new insight to design preventive measures against suicidal attempts.