Just $1 more per person can cut suicides by 6%: American study

MUMBAI: An addition of as little as $1 (or Rs 72) to minimum wages could reduce suicides in the US by up to 6% annually, suggests a new American study. This study came a few days ahead of the National Crime Records Bureau's 2018 data that revealed that seven out of 10 suicides were by India's poor who earned less than Rs 1 lakh per annum. Experts say social and environmental factors in suicides should not be downplayed but considered as important as mental health factors.

Dr Debasish Basu, editor of the Indian Journal of Social Psychiatry and professor at PGIMER Chandigarh, said basic social drivers of suicides are more important on a "macro scale than biological factors". He said while individual factors of suicide such as genetics, developmental or early childhood issues play a role, the social and economic factors cannot be "emphasised enough".

Here's another detail from NCRB data that underlines poverty as a deciding factor in suicides: 12,936 unemployed people committed suicide in 2018, higher than the number of farmers (10,349) who took their lives.

The 25-year-long American study published in the indexed Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health last week said that between 1990 and 2015, raising the minimum wage by $1 in each state might have saved more than 27,000 lives. An increase of $2 in each state's minimum wage could have prevented more than 57,000 suicides, the study added.

Consider Brazil, which in 2003 introduced the Bolsa Familia Programme to provide low-income families with cash transfers on the condition that they send their children to school and ensure that they are properly vaccinated. A study published in the May 2019 edition of Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology said that municipal areas that offered higher cash transfers over a three-year period witnessed a reduced suicide rate.

Suicides, said Pune-based psychiatrist Soumitra Pathare, are an intersectoral problem and mental health is only one aspect. "Verbal autopsies have shown that 50% of the people who commit suicide did not show any mental health problems or symptoms," he said.

Unfortunately in India, suicide by farmers is seen as a social issue, while suicides by non-farmers as a mental health issue. "We miss the obvious fact that every suicide is a mix of social and mental health issues," the psychiatrist added.

Pathare said that it is important to underline to people as well as the administration that suicides are preventable. "We need policy interventions and the community needs to get serious about checking the number of suicides," he added.

Mumbai-based psychiatrist Harish Shetty said the government needs to expand pro-poor policies. "The increases in suicide rates are a consequence of fewer mental health professionals and low priority by the state. A mental health policy is a must, with a focused ministry with a mental health minister at the Centre and in states. Even districts and cities need mental health commissioners," Shetty said.