Suicide by statistics

A recent report titled ‘suicides hit all-time highs in Singapore’ first broke on the AFP, and subsequently got picked up by Bangkok Post, Yahoo! News Singapore, and even Fox news.

With all this attention, I wouldn’t fault someone for thinking that life in the land of eternal sunshine is a weary façade for depressed souls trying to claw their way out of Singapore Inc. 

Foolish Singaporeans, there is no escape!

It’s a catchy headline, I can’t fault them for that, but out of curiosity, I went looking for the dataset from the Samaritans of Singapore, and the claims are entirely true:

Suicides in Singapore hit an all-time high of 487 in 2012 as more young people bogged down by stress and relationship woes took their own lives, a charity group dealing with the problem said Friday.

The tally, a 29 percent increase from the 2011 total, was boosted by an 80 percent rise in the 20-29 age bracket, the Samaritans of Singapore (SOS) said in a statement. (Link)

But what feels a little lacking is some perspective. 

After all, a one year 29% increase in suicides does not a trend make. Drawing up the data showed the absolute number of suicides was indeed at all-time highs, but given a larger population to begin with, it doesn't seem entirely alarming.

I should probably point out that suicide through the lens of data and statistics is not the same as drilling down to the experience of each individual. The question I’m asking is not about the individual, it’s about the population as a whole, and every individual’s case is uniquely tragic.

But overall, society seems to be doing fairly all right.

Sources:

Total suicides, Source: Registry of Births and Deaths, Immigration and Checkpoints Authority, Singapore. Last accessed: http://www.samaritans.org.sg/National-Statistics.pdf

Population: Extracted from www.singstat.gov.sg

From a different angle, if total number of suicides is expressed as a percentage of total population, it still looks fairly stable.

Sources:

Total suicides, Source: Registry of Births and Deaths, Immigration and Checkpoints Authority, Singapore. Last accessed: http://www.samaritans.org.sg/National-Statistics.pdf

Population: Extracted from www.singstat.gov.sg

Now, if we were to compare suicides with total death rate, the picture shifts slightly.

Sources:

Death rate: CIA World Factbook

Total suicides: Source: Registry of Births and Deaths, Immigration and Checkpoints Authority, Singapore. Last accessed: http://www.samaritans.org.sg/National-Statistics.pdf

Population: Extracted from www.singstat.gov.sg

Things might look quite alarming, if not for the fact that while suicides are at all-time highs, death rates are at all-time lows: 3.41 deaths per 1000 population, according to the CIA World Factbook.

So the question becomes: why don't the all-time low death rates make headlines?