BROADCASTS.com

b'There are 200,000 hospital admissions for self harm in the UK every year mostly in young women. 1in 10 female adolescents have self harmed compared to 1 in 15 in the general population. In young women it is shooting up possibly due to social media bullying. 50% are preceded by alcohol use and 25% express serious suicide intent especially the older you are. Attempted suicide increases the risk of future suicide by a factor of two. Women are more likely to become repeat self harmers as a way of relieving stress or attention/help seeking. Every second 3 people commit suicide world wide. 30 a day in the UK and 150 a day in the US. In the UK 3/4 are men with suicide being the commonest cause of death in the 20-45 age group although the the highest risk group is the 45-50 group at 15/10,000. For women the highest risk group is the 55-60 group at 8/10,000. Men over 75 used to be the highest risk but this has halved mainly due to the National Suicide Prevention Strategy. Suicide rate has reduced by 20% in the last 20 years in the UK. About 80-90% of suicide victims have mental illness. In the US the suicide rate has gone up 30% in the last 20 years with half not bein mentally ill and half being gun shot wounds. Risk factors include depression, anxiety, alcohol and drug abuse -especially opiate overdoses in the US, stress financial and social, history of self harm and family history of Suicide. It is 10x commoner in low social class. Only the tiny minority of mentally ill people commit suicide and this can be reduced further with appropriate monitoring and treatment both with medication, and with psychological and social interventions. America needs to take the lesson of Norway and Portugal and focus on social re integration of drug addicts rather than just being punitive. Furthermore unless the rest of the world also seriously heed this as well what is happening in America will as usual spread to the rest of us.'