Is NC Seeing An Increase In Youth Suicide Due To The Pandemic?

/ caffeinatedrage

This is an important read from North Carolina Health News.

Here are some of the highlights as reported by Hannah Critchfield:

“North Carolina currently lacks data for deaths by suicide in young people in 2020. The state doesn’t have a comprehensive electronic death registry – meaning it has a slower system for reporting deaths than all but two other states.”

“Children in North Carolina were hospitalized for self-harm injuries, including suicide attempts, slightly less last year than in 2019, according to data obtained by information request from the state Department of Health and Human Services.“

Chart shows the Self-Inflicted/Self-Harm Emergency Department Visits Among Children Ages 10-18 in North Carolina by Race/Ethnicity, 2019-2020. Overall, the visits have decreased by a few hundred, dropping across every racial and ethnic group except

“Existing studies that have analyzed suicide during the pandemic have not found evidence that deaths by suicide are increasing overall.”

“Suicide is complex,” said Cubbage. “This narrative that suicide is increasing due to the pandemic is not only unsupported by the data at this time, it also completely ignores the disparities impacting minority groups before the pandemic — and the impacts of the racial and political landscape in our country over the past year.”