Suicide numbers during the first 9-15 months of the COVID-19 pandemic compared with pre-existing trends: An interrupted time series analysis in 33 countries

Why is this work in the frame?

A frame that forgets how it found something cannot be audited. These are the routes that admitted this work.

Full frame distilled prediction

Learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and 10,348 direct Gemma labels. Candidate is the union of thresholded teacher heads; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels or direct frontier model labels.

Candidate categories

Insufficient payload (model declined to judge)

Consensus categories

none

Domain

Candidate signal: noneConsensus signal: none

Study design

Candidate signal: ObservationalConsensus signal: Observational

Genre

Candidate signal: EmpiricalConsensus signal: Empirical

Teacher disagreement score

0.036

Threshold uncertainty score

0.997

Validation status

machine_predicted_unvalidated · codex-gemma-dda1882f352a

Codex and Gemma teacher scores by category

Machine scores (provisional)

The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.

Teacher spread

0.348 · how far apart the two teachers sit on this one work

Validation status

score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from it

Abstract

Background: Predicted increases in suicide were not generally observed in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the picture may be changing and patterns might vary across demographic groups. We aimed to provide a timely, granular picture of the pandemic's impact on suicides globally. Methods: We identified suicide data from official public-sector sources for countries/areas-within-countries, searching websites and academic literature and contacting data custodians and authors as necessary. We sent our first data request on 22nd June 2021 and stopped collecting data on 31st October 2021. We used interrupted time series (ITS) analyses to model the association between the pandemic's emergence and total suicides and suicides by sex-, age- and sex-by-age in each country/area-within-country. We compared the observed and expected numbers of suicides in the pandemic's first nine and first 10-15 months and used meta-regression to explore sources of variation. Findings: We sourced data from 33 countries (24 high-income, six upper-middle-income, three lower-middle-income; 25 with whole-country data, 12 with data for area(s)-within-the-country, four with both). There was no evidence of greater-than-expected numbers of suicides in the majority of countries/areas-within-countries in any analysis; more commonly, there was evidence of lower-than-expected numbers. Certain sex, age and sex-by-age groups stood out as potentially concerning, but these were not consistent across countries/areas-within-countries. In the meta-regression, different patterns were not explained by countries' COVID-19 mortality rate, stringency of public health response, economic support level, or presence of a national suicide prevention strategy. Nor were they explained by countries' income level, although the meta-regression only included data from high-income and upper-middle-income countries, and there were suggestions from the ITS analyses that lower-middle-income countries fared less well. Interpretation: Although there are some countries/areas-within-countries where overall suicide numbers and numbers for certain sex- and age-based groups are greater-than-expected, these countries/areas-within-countries are in the minority. Any upward movement in suicide numbers in any place or group is concerning, and we need to remain alert to and respond to changes as the pandemic and its mental health and economic consequences continue. Funding: None.

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The record

Venue

EClinicalMedicine

Topic

COVID-19 and Mental Health

Field

Psychology

Canadian institutions

Health Sciences CentreUniversity of TorontoSunnybrook Health Science Centre

Funders

National Institute of Mental HealthNational Health and Medical Research CouncilAustralian Research CouncilPatient Safety Translational Research CentreNIHR Greater Manchester Patient Safety Translational Research CentreVlaamse regeringElizabeth Blackwell Institute for Health Research, University of BristolUniversity of TorontoBundesministerium für GesundheitFonds Wetenschappelijk OnderzoekMinisterstvo Školství, Mládeže a TělovýchovyNational Natural Science Foundation of ChinaEconomic and Social Research CouncilSwansea UniversityUniversity of ManchesterMedical Research CouncilDepartment of Health and Social CareUniversity of EdinburghNational Institute for Health and Care ResearchInternational Seafood Sustainability FoundationHealth Service ExecutiveAustralian GovernmentLivaNovaUniversity Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation TrustHealth and Care Research WalesScottish GovernmentQueensland HealthErasmus+MQ: Transforming Mental HealthEuropean CommissionWorld Health OrganizationUniversity of BristolInternational Association for Suicide PreventionSubstance Abuse and Mental Health Services AdministrationQueensland GovernmentUniverzita Karlova v Praze

Keywords

MedicineCoronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)Pandemic2019-20 coronavirus outbreakSevere acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)Interrupted Time Series AnalysisInterrupted time seriesSeries (stratigraphy)Poison controlMedical emergencySuicide preventionVirologyOutbreakPsychiatryStatisticsInternal medicinePsychological intervention

Has abstract in OpenAlex

yes

API

/api/v1/works/W4289516299