Pandemic: Suicide rate rises among women and the elderly
In the first year of the Covid pandemic, suicide rates in Brazil got higher among women (7%) and the elderly (9%) but remained stable in the general population. There was also a wide variation in deaths between regions of the country. The conclusion is from a study by UFRGS (Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul), Hospital de Clinicas de Porto Alegre (RS) and Unisinos. It was published in the Revista Brasileira de Psiquiatria ( Brazilian Journal of Psychiatry) and it compared suicide data from DataSUS recorded in 2020 (11,334 in total) with the average of the previous ten years. Regarding the suicide of women, the North and Southeast regions had the highest increases, with 26% and 23%, respectively. In absolute numbers, male deaths are almost four times higher than those of women (8,881 against 2,470 in 2020). Among people over 60 years old, the North also accounted for the highest increase (53%). Among young people, up to 19 years old, there was greater growth in the number of deaths in the Midwest (33%), followed by the North (30%) and Southeast (29%).