Lack of Employment Raises Suicide Risk

Published Online: Saturday, November 1, 2003   [ Request Print ]

    Unemployment impacts all areas of an individual?s life, including the risk of suicide. A New Zealand study found that unemployment can triple that risk. (These findings were published recently in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.) Using data from the 1991 New Zealand census, the researchers learned that unemployed 25- to 44- year-old men and women and 45- to 64-year-old men were 2 to 3 times more likely to commit suicide, compared with their employed peers. The researchers suggest that a society?s unemployment rate may be a sign of lack of social cohesion, which in turn is associated with increased suicides.