Hernandez1

Diego Hernandez

Harris

Pre-AP Seminar Period 1

12 May 2020

Suicide in the United States

“Suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the US” with an average of 132 deaths per

day (Suicide Statistics). The AFSP is a foundation that dedicates itself to spreading information

about suicide and providing help for victims. Suicide is a detrimental problem in the United

States which affects countless amounts of people daily with a devastating death toll. Suicide was

“responsible for more than 47,000 deaths in 2017, resulting in about one death every 11 minutes”

(Preventing Suicide). The CDC or Center for Disease Control and Prevention provided the

statistics in awareness for the growing number of suicide victims. The staggering number of

victims continues to increase annually which poses a threat to the United States society due the

sheer number of citizens being affected. The patterns of increase have been stagnant since

“between 1999 and 2016, the U.S. suicide rate increased almost 30 percent to 15.6 per 100,000”

(Tong). Yi Tong gathered the data of suicidal increase in a study on individual characteristics

dealing with suicide. The growth of suicide deaths proves that the U.S. is not taking substantial

efforts to help those in need, otherwise the amount of deaths due to suicide would decrease. The

lack of support poses the question of how the U.S. can provide effective aid in order to decrease

the yearly rates of suicide in the country. To find a plausible solution for the crisis, rigorous help

needs to be given to people that are prone to a potential suicidal act. In order to stop the

increasing rates of suicide in the United States medical and therapeutic help needs to be given to
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victims experiencing depression due to low income and hereditary conditions because suicide

decreases the U.S. life expectancy age and negatively affects a radius of people around.

Before a solution towards decreasing suicide rates in the United States it is important to

acknowledge the root causes towards the cause of death in order to provide a plausible solution.

Depression and the lack of self-pleasure is one of the causes of suicide “since about 2 percent of

those people ever treated for depression in an outpatient setting will die by suicide” (Does

depression increase the risk for suicide?). HHS is the U.S. Department of Health and Humann

services which provides health services and contributes in advances about medicine, public

health, and social services (About HHS). Since depression plays a key role in influencing the

rates of suicide, it is also vital to investigate how depression develops. Depression results from

the increase of negative emotions which can result from hereditary conditions which cannot be

directly changed. Certain genetic structures such as 5-HTTLPR alleles have a high influence

over emotional status. The analytical studies from Genes, Economics, and Happiness proves that

the 5-HTTLPR allele “induced variation in anatomy and function of amygdala-cingulate

feedback circuit critical for emotion regulation indicates one mechanism for a generic

susceptibility for depression”. The uncontrollable factor of genetics for depression is important

in order to establish an applicable solution that can rehabilitate victims of depression and

decrease the chances of suicide. The solution of therapeutic help for those experiencing

depression would severely help cope against the issue of alleles that increase depressed feelings

as it provides a medical aid in a time of uncontrollable desperation. The alternate solution of

medical prescription designed to moderate and counter the ratios of emotions would also prove

effective. Another source of depression develops from sexuality, more specifically those who are

not heterosexual. In a San Diego college case study, Jacob Garcia underwent a questionnaire to
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students in the college asking about their sexuality and physical and sexual abuse background if

any. The studies for women revealed that “71% of the lesbian/bisexual women, compared with

39% of the heterosexual women, reported past suicidal ideation. Thus, the lesbians/bisexual

women were 3.7 times more likely to have considered suicide than the heterosexual women

were”. Lesbian and bisexual women are more prone to having depressed feelings and therefore

having an increased rate of suicide compared to their heterosexual counterparts. The information

of the dramatic variation of suicide vulnerability for homosexual women helps to target a social

group to provide therapeutic help for coping with decreased well-being that results from

mistreatment from their sexuality.

Suicide rates need to be monitored and reduced in order to halt the psychological and

environmental problems they pose on the U.S. society. Suicide is a morbid subject which can be

extremely sensitive towards some people. The reasoning behind people’s emotional vulnerability

towards suicide is because people experience a form of suicidal ideation whether it be directly or

through a known person. Elana Sandler of the National Alliance on Mental Illness examined the

impact radius of suicide using her colleague Ken Norton’s simile of suicide being like a “pebble

in a pond”. To further analyze, Elana projected that “When someone dies by suicide, the people

impacted most dramatically are those closest to the person who died: family, friends, co-workers,

classmates”. When a suicide in the United States occurs, it affects a wide proximity of people

instead of just the suicide victim. The event of a suicide creates serious repercussions towards the

people connected closely to the victim and even those that are not directly related but have been

informed of the death. Therefore, suicide can be dangerously contagious and spiral others who

have come in contact to at least experience some form of depression or even a suicide. During

his 2011 analysis on of celebrity suicides, Andy Coghlan concluded that “suicide rates increased
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by 0.26 per 100,000 population in the month following a death”. Coghlan also discovered that in

regions where the celebrity was well known, the numbers raised to “0.68 in Europe, with similar

rises of 0.64 and 0.58 in North America and Asia.”. The statistics demonstrate the power that the

media and celebrities have over the society in the U.S. and even foreign countries. The loss of a

known person therefore can drive people to reenact suicides whilst being in a state of depression

or make a person more deprived of joy. The celebrity suicides demonstrate the scale that self-

induced deaths can have on the general society. In turn, the platform from the media and overall

ripple effect of a suicide death leads to higher possibility of death which has a negative effect of

the U.S. demographic statistics. For example, Namkee Choi conducted a study where life

expectancy was impacted due to suicide from variable such as gender and age. Choi’s results

calculated that life expectancy changes were “1.64 years in 2011 and 1.60 years in 2015 for men,

and 1.30 years in 2011 and 1.27 years in 2015 for women”. As the rates of suicide increase due

to the repetitive nature of deaths and the level of projection from the media, the U.S. suffers in

factors such as life expectancy which will continue to decrease as time progresses unless

solutions against suicide are made.

In order to be able to decrease the annual suicide rates, a plausible and effective solution

needs to take place in order to produce significant results. One reliable solution towards reducing

the suicide mortality rates in the United States would be a medication prescription such as

antidepressants. Antidepressants provide positive results for those experiencing suicidal ideations

and prove to be effective. The Institution for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care conducted an

experiment with antidepressants and a control group with a placebo to determine the validity of

antidepressants. The results were that about “20 to 40 out of 100 people who took a placebo

noticed an improvement in their symptoms within six to eight weeks” (Depression: How...). On
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the other end of the spectrum, “about 40 to 60 out of 100 people who took an antidepressant

noticed an improvement in their symptoms within six to eight weeks”. The results of the

experiment further prove that antidepressants do in fact serve their purpose in relieving suicidal

ideations and symptoms. Therefore, antidepressants are worthy of a solution for decreasing

suicidal rates and needs to be implemented towards the people who are experiencing depressed

symptoms. In order to do so the other step towards decreasing the suicide rates would be

increasing the accessibility of antidepressants for the people in society in misery.

Antidepressants are restricted or used in limited amounts due to their side effects besides

providing suicidal symptom relief. For example, adolescents and young children experiencing

suicidal ideation usually are not treated with antidepressants. For example, Eric Pearson from

Ball State University conducted a study on antidepressants and adolescents where he found that

between “2003 and 2006 there was a 20% drop in the number of SSRI prescriptions for persons

younger than 10 years and a 10% drop for persons between the ages of 15 and 19 years (Gibbons

et al., 2007)”. Society cohort groups like those in adolescence are just some of the people that are

not able to receive medical prescriptions to relieve their suicidal ideations. In turn this leads to an

increase in suicides for those in adolescence due to their limited aid in mental health. More

access for adolescence and other social groups would be another step in helping to limit the

suicide rates in the United States.

A possible limitation towards the solution of having antidepressants as the primary

solution towards decreasing suicide rates in the U.S. would be negative side effects. The Harvard

Medical School on an article about the side effects of SSRI antidepressants stated that some

“patients taking SSRIs develop insomnia, skin rashes, headaches, joint and muscle pain, stomach

upset, nausea, or diarrhea. These problems are usually temporary or mild or both”.
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Antidepressants as their downside commonly includes temporary side effects of mild discomfort.

While the SSRI antidepressants have short-term side effects, the beneficiaries of SSRIs and other

antidepressants outweighs the drawbacks for patients experiencing suicidal ideation. In the long

run, antidepressants also benefit the patient to not experience more relapses of suicidal symptoms

as frequently. With the experimentation from the Institution for Quality and Efficiency in

Medical Care discussed earlier, they tested the frequency of depressed symptom relapses and

found that “23 out of 100 people who took an antidepressant had a relapse within one to two

years”. On the contrary, “50 out of 100 people who took a placebo had a relapse within one to

two years”. To further analyze the results, the patients who were treated with an antidepressant

experienced less relapses in a longer span of time than those who were given a placebo. The

reduction of relapses displays the effectiveness of antidepressants like SSRIs and shows that the

complementary side effects have a minor impact for the longevity of the patient's mental health.

The reasoning behind the effectiveness behind antidepressants such as SSRIs is their ability to

ease symptoms of suicide in patients. The Mayo Clinic in an informational article of selective

serotonin reuptake inhibitors states that SSRIs send increasing levels of serotonin and “SSRIs

block the reabsorption (reuptake) of serotonin into neurons. This makes more serotonin available

to improve transmission of messages between neurons”. The Mayo Clinic also defines serotonin

as “one of the chemical messengers (neurotransmitters) that carry signals between brain nerve

cells (neurons)”. The definition of serotonin and the function is important for understanding why

it helps to relieve suicidal ideation since it increases signals towards the neurons. The

implementation of serotonin also helps to cope against those with unfortunate genetic structure

like those with the 5-HTTLPR allele by helping to control the emotional status of a suicidal or
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depressed patient. Other solutions besides antidepressants would not be as potent in curing

suicidal symptoms resulting from genetic structures.

To conclude, the solution of increased therapeutic and medical aid towards people

experiencing depression due to factors like low income and hereditary conditions would serve to

decrease the rising amount of suicide deaths in the United States. More specifically, medical

access towards suicide-prone patients needs to be more open to limit the amount of suicide rates

because patients need to receive treatment in order to have a successful chance to recovering.

Suicide was discussed to be severely contagious, having a ripple effect on society and the

relatives surrounding the suicide victim. The explosive nature of suicide leaves a serious problem

to be observed and action to reduce death rates needs to be taken. The rigorous implementation

of therapeutic and medical products such as antidepressants are a major step in the right direction

towards helping depressed victims. The successful rates of antidepressants working to prevent

relapses of depression in patients furthermore supports why medical aid is a worthy solution and

why it needs to be more accessible. Psychologists who have depressed patients should encourage

the use of antidepressants when suicidal ideology is turning severe and therapeutic session when

cases are milder. If the solutions towards suicide are not improved or accepted the trend of rising

annual suicide rates in the United States will continue to rise since the suicide-prone victims will

not be receiving sufficient help to overcome suicide which will result in others being impacted or

driven into depressed state of minds.

WC:2,177
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Works Cited

Coghlan, Andy. “The Fading American Dream: Suicide Rates Are on the Rise in the US at a

Time When Other Rich Nations Are Recording a Decline. What Has Gone Wrong.” New

Scientist, vol. 238, no. 3184, June 2018, pp. 22–23. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1016/S0262-

4079(18)31149-7. Accessed 04 March 2020

Choi, Namkee. “Impact of suicide mortality on life expectancy in the United States, 2011 and

2015: age and sex decomposition” ResearchGate,

www.researchgate.net/publication/337316614_Impact_of_suicide_mortality_on_life_expecta

ncy_in_the_United_States_2011_and_2015_age_and_sex_decomposition. Accessed 5 March

2020.

De Neve, Jan-Emmanuel, et al. “Genes, Economics, and Happiness.” Journal of Neuroscience,

Psychology, and Economics, Nov. 2012, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3858957/.

Accessed 02 March 2020

“Depression: How Effective Are Antidepressants?” InformedHealth, 12 Jan. 2017,

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK361016/. Accessed 15 March 2020.

“Does Depression Increase the Risk for Suicide?” HHS, 21 Aug. 2015,

www.hhs.gov/answers/mental-health-and-substance-abuse/does-depression-increase-risk-of-

suicide/index.html. Accessed 01 March 2020.

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Garcia, Jacob, et al. “Links between Past Abuse, Suicide Ideation, and Sexual Orientation among

San Diego College Students.” Journal of American College Health, vol. 51, no. 1, Jan. 2002,

pp. 9–14. EBSCOhost,

search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eric&AN=EJ662048&site=ehost-live.

Accessed 04 March 2020.

Harvard Health Publishing. “What Are the Real Risks of Antidepressants?” Harvard Health,

www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/what-are-the-real-risks-of-antidepressants.

Accessed 20 March 2020.

Pierson, Eric E. “Antidepressants and Suicidal Ideation in Adolescence: A Paradoxical Effect.”

Psychology in the Schools, vol. 46, no. 9, Nov. 2009, pp. 910–914. EBSCOhost,

doi:10.1002/pits.20432. Accessed 19 March 2020.

“Preventing Suicide.” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 5 Sept. 2019,

www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/suicide/fastfact.html. Accessed 08 April 2020

Sandler, Elana. “The Ripple Effect Of Suicide” NAMI, 10 September 2018,

www.nami.org/Blogs/NAMI-Blog/September-2018/The-Ripple-Effect-of-Suicide. Accessed 02

March 2020.

“Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)” Mayo Clinic, 17 Sept. 2019,

www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/depression/in-depth/ssris/art-20044825. Accessed

01 March 2020.

“Suicide Statistics.” AFSP, 16 Apr. 2019, afsp.org/about-suicide/suicide-statistics/. Accessed 08

April 2020
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Tong, Yi. “Understanding Changes in Attitudes Toward Suicide Between 1980s and 2010s in the

United States*.” Social Science Quarterly (Wiley-Blackwell), vol. 99, no. 5, Nov. 2018, pp.

1585–1598. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1111/ssqu.12522. Accessed 08 April 2020