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Suicide: The Terror of Life
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# : |
13440 |
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Section : |
CURRENT ISSUES
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| Issue
Date : |
9 / 1987 |
2,686 Words |
| Author
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Connaught Marshner
Connaught Marshner is a writer and editor of Conservative
Digest, in Washington, D.C. |
If you're looking for suicide data, don't go out in civilian dress. There's a war on. The National Center for Health Statistics will present one set of figures, collected from death certificates. Suicidologists (as they call themselves, a select subgroup of mental health professionals) dispute them.
Charlotte Ross, head of both the Legislative Committee of the American Association of Suicidology and the Youth Suicide National Center, told the author that the death-certificate figures are off by at least two-to-one. Why ? Well, argue the suicidologists, there are crosscurrents at work in filling out death certificates: family members who can't believe it has happened, who are anxious to avoid the stigma it will give their family or the harm it will cause to younger siblings; coroners with rigid policies (one reportedly will never write suicide as cause of death unless a note is found); and ignorance of the circumstances surrounding some deaths.
For example, there are some strangulation fads in autoeroticism, which lead to accidental death among boys. Parents tend not to know of such things and police officers, who may know, often decide to spare their feelings.
Some mental health professionals say that alcohol and drug use are self-destructive behavior, essentially the same as suicide, and would include accidents under the influence of either in the category of suicide.
So there is a problem of definition. In the popular press the headlines are crisis-oriented, and in legislative hallways the focus is program-oriented. In both places,
... (1997 of 15787 Characters)
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