India tops in suicide numbers, says WHO

New Delhi, Sep 5: India is the suicide hotspot of the world, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO) report, which said that around 2.58 lakh people took their own lives, the highest for any country across the globe.

The WHO figures, however, do not match with the official records. The WHO’s figure is higher by 1.12 lakh compared to the 1.35 lakh suicides reported by India’s National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) in 2012.

The WHO said 1,58,098 men and 99,977 women committed suicide in India in 2012, while the NCRB said that 88,453 men and 46,992 women committed suicide.

The WHO put India’s suicide rate at 21.1 per 1 lakh people.

“Most suicides in the world occur in the south-east Asia region (39% of those in low and middle-income countries) with India accounting for the highest number of suicides overall in 2012,” the WHO report said.

In its response, the WHO told Deccan Herald that the analysis of causes of death in India was based on data between 2001 and 2003, recorded by the Million Death Study.

Data from this study was further adjusted with information from WHO technical programmes and UNAIDS on specific causes where more detailed information was available from surveillance, surveys or other sources and the cause-specific estimates were adjusted to add to WHO estimates of age-gender specific all-cause mortality for India, it said.

“As India is one of the two largest countries in the world in terms of population, it is not surprising that the number of suicides is high relative to other countries. What is more important is whether the suicide rate is high.

In terms of suicide rate per 1,00,000 population, India is ranked 13th in 2012, behind South Korea, Sri Lanka, Hungary, Japan, Russia and some other countries,” the WHO said.

The report released in Geneva on Thursday said more than 8 lakh people committed suicide. “Every 40 seconds, a person commits suicide somewhere in the world and many more attempt suicide,” the report said. Suicide rates show a peak among the young and the elderly, it said.

“This report, the first WHO publication of its kind, presents a comprehensive overview of suicide, suicide attempts and successful suicide prevention efforts worldwide. We know what works. Now is the time to act,” Dr Shekhar Saxena, director of WHO’s Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse.