If Freddie
Mercury were alive, I’d ask his opinion of the Nova Scotia government’s
51-page report on suicide that was finally released last week. The
Queen singer, who died of AIDS in 1991, might thrust out his hairy
chest, give me his trademark, buck-toothed smile, and belt out “Don’t
Try Suicide”: “So you think it’s the easy way out? You think
you’re gonna slash your wrists this time? Don’t do that—you got a
good thing going now. Don’t do it, don’t do it, don’t!”
Mercury’s 1980 hit takes a snappy, simplistic look at suicide. But
it fits in squarely with the idea that suicide is a tragic waste. In
November 2006, a provincial report pointed out that suicide and
attempted suicide are among the top three causes of death and hospital
stays for those 16 and older. It added that suicide strains emergency
health, medical and psychiatric services and costs the provincial
economy an estimated $100 million every year.
Back in 2006, government officials set out a seven to 10-year
suicide prevention plan. As a first step, they commissioned a report
from experts at Dalhousie University assessing trends among age and
income groups, comparing regional statistics and analyzing suicide risk
factors. That report was supposed to be released in the winter of 2007,
but the final draft wasn’t completed until last fall. Two months ago,
when the report had still not appeared, The Coast raised questions
about why provincial officials were so slow in releasing it. We quoted
the report’s author, Peter Nestman, interim director of Dal’s
Population Health Research Unit.
“We came up with a draft report, and it was, I guess controversial,”
Nestman told us. They “asked me to provide some analysis of the
statistics and so forth, and so I did that, and the government wanted
some of that stuff out, so I took that out.” That was in May. Now that
the report has finally been made public, Nestman refuses to say more,
adding that the document speaks for itself.
OK. On page 37, it states that people with the lowest incomes had a
significantly higher suicide death rate compared to those in the
highest income brackets. Interesting, but what about Nova Scotia’s
below-the-poverty-line welfare rates? Or its abysmal record of
providing affordable housing? Could these be factors in suicide? The
report says it wasn’t possible to analyze any government programs or
services in relation to suicide. Not welfare, not housing, not mental
health services, not the prison system, not the police or the
courts.
OK. The report says drug and alcohol abuse increases the likelihood
of suicide, especially among people suffering from depression and
anxiety. Could the province’s policy of making alcohol more available
by extending liquor store and bar hours be a factor in suicide? And
what about the urgent need for more addiction treatment services in
Nova Scotia? And what about the relationship of prescription drugs to
suicide? “Prescription medication was initially examined,” the report
says, “however, results were not deemed to be evaluable due to
incomplete data.”
OK. What about suicide rates among First Nations people or young
lesbians, gays or bisexuals? A 2006 report says that in some aboriginal
communities, suicide rates are three to five times higher than in the
general population, while lesbian, gay and bisexual young people are
three times more likely to die from suicide. But the report released
last week merely notes in its typically bureaucratic language: “At the
time of this report, there were no datasets available that could be
used to analyze these cohorts.”
OK. The report does contain interesting statistics including ones
showing that overall suicide rates seem to be declining slightly. But
its lack of analysis raises many questions about the province’s overall
commitment to solving the complex and difficult problems associated
with suicide. As Freddie Mercury once sang, “Don’t try suicide, You’re
just gonna hate it. Don’t try suicide. Nobody gives a damn.”
This article appears in Jul 23-29, 2009.
