Suicide Attempt Rates for Black Teens Continue to Rise – By Katelyn Newman (US News) / Oct 14 2019
While suicide ideation and planning decreased across all races, rates of suicide attempts increased among black adolescents between 1991 and 2017.
Black teens are increasingly attempting suicide, a new study finds, raising alarm amid a growing crisis of suicide among America’s youth.
Researchers at the McSilver Institute for Poverty Policy and Research at New York University examined data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Youth Risk Behavior Survey on rates of suicide ideation, planning, attempts and related injuries among U.S. public and private high school students by race, ethnicity and gender between 1991 and 2017. The report, published in the journal Pediatrics on Monday, included a sample of 198,540 students from all 50 states and the District of Columbia that were categorized as non-Hispanic white, non-Hispanic black, non-Hispanic Asian or Pacific Islander, Hispanic, American Indian/Alaska Native and non-Hispanic multiple races.
They found that self-reported suicide attempts among black students rose during the time period while it declined or did not significantly change among all other races and ethnicities in the study. Further, there was a significant increase in related injuries from suicide attempts among black male teens, the report said, and suicide attempts increased at an accelerating rate among black female teens despite an overall decline in female suicide attempts.
“It is urgent that we get to the bottom of why the rate of suicide attempts among Black female adolescents is accelerating,” Dr. Michael Lindsey, executive director of the McSilver Institute and the lead author of the study, said in a statement. “We also need to understand why Black males are increasingly injured in suicide attempts.”
Overall, suicide thoughts and planning rates declined while actual suicide attempts increased, the researchers found. All three are the highest risk factors for suicide, according to the report.
“Further research must be done into why traditional precursors to suicide attempts, such as thinking about it or making plans, are decreasing while actual attempts are going up,” Lindsey said. “It’s important that we identify the signs before young people attempt to end their lives.”
Suicide rates among younger African American children have also been on the rise, with black boys and girls between the ages of 5 and 12 taking their lives at about twice the rate of white kids the same age, and a separate study out earlier this year found the number of emergency room visits for suicide attempts among youth ages 5 to 17 skyrocketed between 2007 and 2015. Suicide remains the second leading cause of death among people ages 10 to 34 in the U.S., according to the CDC.
White youth have historically had higher rates of suicide attempts and deaths by suicide compared with their black counterparts, the report said, but its findings show a concerning increase in suicide attempts among black teens. The researchers note that documented disparities in mental health treatment and mistrust in health care providers as well as social and environmental factors, such as racial discrimination, adverse childhood experiences and poverty, have all been positively associated with suicidal and self-harm behaviors among black youth.
“Examining trends in suicidal ideation and behaviors over time by sex and race and ethnicity allows us to determine where to focus prevention and intervention efforts,” the report said. “Future research should be used to examine the underlying reasons for these observed changes.”
While suicide ideation and planning decreased across all races, ethnicities and genders, rates of suicide attempts increased among black adolescents between 1991 and 2017, and related injuries increased among black males. (Getty Images)
