There remains a resilient and misguided narrative that suicide rates, across all groups, skyrocketed during the pandemic. This is not true. Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show a decrease in overall suicides in 2020 as compared with 2019. However, there were communities disproportionately impacted. When we control for ethnicity and income, we see spikes. Big spikes.
Some groups saw increases despite overall drop in suicide rates
According to the report by the CDC, based on data from 99 percent of all death records from 2020, the overall suicide rate in 2020 dropped 3 percent compared with 2019. This means that almost 46,000 people died from suicide in 2020, roughly 1,600 fewer than in 2019. Suicides among women saw an overall drop of 8 percent from 2019 to 2020 and men saw a 2 percent drop during the same period.
However, that only tells part of the story. Among Black girls and women, aged 10-24 years old, suicide rates rose. This group saw suicide rates increase more than 30 percent. Black boys and men in the same age group saw a 23 percent increase from 2019 to 2020.
Hispanic/Latina women in that age group saw suicides increase 40 percent, and Hispanic/Latino men of the same age saw a 20 percent increase, according to the report. Meanwhile, Asian women ages 15 to 25 saw a nearly 30 percent increase in suicides.
Show me the money: Poverty as a factor
When we look at ethnicity, we see a significant increase in suicides from 2019 to 2020 and that needs a bright spotlight focused directly on it. This confirms our understanding of the role of white supremacy/privilege and racial disparities. We know ethnicity impacts a person’s health and Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) folks are disproportionately denied access to healthcare as compared with White people. When we also look at income, we see another spike.
Around the globe, many governments provided their citizens money to survive during the lockdowns, with the United States being one of these countries. The pandemic funds often exceeded the typical government financial assistance and even working wages people would have otherwise earned. As a result, poverty dropped in the U.S. and suicide rates dropped along with it. As a comparison, in Canada, where the emergency government money was large and lasting, the suicide rate dropped roughly 30 percent. Although data on how poorer countries addressed cash transfers to poor people during the pandemic is inconclusive, it appears providing people with additional money reduced suicides.
[image_caption]Gary Norman[/image_caption]
A paper published in the National Bureau of Economic Research in 2020 showed that those in poverty are more vulnerable to suicide because the strain drastically increases a person’s odds of developing a mental illness which can lead to suicide. The study looked specifically at depression and anxiety and showed a marked increase in the levels of mental illness for people in poverty.
Intersectionality
When we attempt to look at both ethnicity and income and their relationship to suicide, we must ask new questions. Despite the evidence, many seem reluctant to recognize the link between suicide and people’s inability to meet their basic needs. What is the correlation between ethnicity, income and suicide? We need an intersectional lens and analysis to better understand.
Even in research studies or opinion pieces concluding that poverty raises suicide risk, authors will often fail to suggest addressing racism or poverty itself, instead suggesting traditional anti-suicide interventions such as increasing mental health services or access to suicide hotlines. These are necessary to capture the people in immediate need of intervention, but what if we can get people off the suicide path earlier?
A Slate article from November of 2021 makes the insightful observation that if the diagnosis is money and the prescription is money, we might have to confront the fundamental building blocks of our economy. If we add ethnicity as a primary driver of suicides and the solution is to confront white supremacy, we have turned our understanding of this problem upside down.
To be clear, ending racial disparities and poverty would not end suicide. Many other factors are at play, and many of the traditional intervention strategies are needed and worthwhile. If data truly drove decisions, we’d look at systemic racial disparities that impact suicide and support individuals and families through difficult economic times, much like we did for part of the pandemic.
Gary Norman is the chief operating officer at Twin Cities Health Services and adjunct instructor at Augsburg University.
Please show me where a person of color has been denied healthcare because of their skin color. That is a big statement and I hope there is evidence to back it up. It is not hard to understand that most suicides are from folks who feel hopeless and hopelessness hits all folks, regardless of skin color. Trying to infer race and racism is a driver in suicides is just another off ramp in the divide game now being played.
You think maybe instilling hope in all people would be a goal? Education, being able to live in a safe neighborhood, prospect of a good job, encouraging loving two parent families and support for folks suffering from depression would help more than baseless claims of racism.
Claims of racism in healthcare delivery are not baseless:
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/community/health-equity/race-ethnicity.html
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4194634/
https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human_rights_magazine_home/the-state-of-healthcare-in-the-united-states/racial-disparities-in-health-care/
Do any of these documents state that poor BIPOCS have worse health than poor whites? Cut and paste, then cite the document. I don’t want to go searching through multiple lengthy articles only to find what you’re claiming isn’t there.
All three articles address racial disparities in healthcare for the entirety of each article. Time is probably less of an obstacle for you glance at any part of these articles than is resistance to admitting systemic racism exists. Systemic racism is thoroughly documented. Refusing to look at any evidence of it is a common “conservative” tactic. (As is believing evidence that cannot be produced.)
Since you are so pressed for time, citations from the cited links:
American Bar Association: “National Academy of Medicine (NAM)… found that ‘racial and ethnic minorities receive lower-quality health care than white people—even when insurance status, income, age, and severity of conditions are comparable.’”
NIH: “More striking, and disconcerting to many is the large and growing number of studies that find racial differences in the receipt of major therapeutic procedures for a broad range of conditions even after adjustment for insurance status and severity of disease (Harris, Andrews, and Elixhauser, 1997; Wenneker and Epstein,1989). Especially surprising to many are the racial disparities in contexts where differences in economic status and insurance coverage are minimized such as the Veterans Health Administration System (Whittle et al., 1993) and the Medicare program (McBean and Gornick, 1994). ”
Speaking of how valuable personal time is, I spent about two seconds highlighting a blatantly false sentence of Joe’s post and then Google spent 0.55 seconds producing 35,400 results. Then I chose the most reliable sources found on page 1 of search results. I scanned them to make sure they represented my claim – about information that is already well known among people who believe in evidence-based knowledge.
“National Academy of Medicine (NAM)… found that ‘racial and ethnic minorities receive lower-quality health care than white people—even when insurance status, income, age, and severity of conditions are comparable.” Why? Why would “racial and ethnic minorities receive lower-quality health care than white people”? And if true, which I highly doubt, is it because of racism? On it’s face it’s ridiculous. Doctors aren’t racist. Hospitals aren’t racist. If something doesn’t make sense you don’t swallow it whole. Tell me why I should believe this.
As stated above, you wouldn’t.
You’re not the only person with resistance to admitting systemic racism exists even though systemic racism is thoroughly documented. Refusing to look at any evidence is a common “conservative” tactic. So is behaving as if the validity of evidence is personal choice.
Yes, I would. I ask if the evidence supports the conclusion. I may well change my opinion, as I have before on this forum.
The evidence supports the conclusion. You just don’t like the conclusion.
I don’t agree with the conclusion. It’s perfectly valid to question the argument when the conclusion makes no sense.
Please tell us why “the conclusion makes no sense.”
Your unsupported opinion that “Doctors aren’t racist. Hospitals aren’t racist” is not going to help your argument any.
You admitted that you were unwilling to read any of the articles and asked for cut and paste statements. Then, you take those statements and say you don’t agree. If you didn’t read the articles, you are uneducated about whether the conclusion is believable or not. I recommend that you take a few steps back and read the article, then maybe form a coherent argument based on the contents and data presented in the article. No one else needs to do the work for you. Cripes.
“If we add ethnicity as a primary driver of suicides and the solution is to confront white supremacy,”
What are the suicide rates for poor white people? They aren’t listed here. If there are increases in suicide among poor whites that puts a damper on:
“This confirms our understanding of the role of white supremacy/privilege”
When elsewhere you state that poor people regardless of ethnicity are much more likely than wealthy people to die by suicide.
I guess my real question is, why in discussions like this and around economics generally do poor white people get ignored?
“I guess my real question is, why in discussions like this and around economics generally do poor white people get ignored?”
Why? Because it debunks the race narrative. Once you factor income, race vanishes. Poor whites have identical outcomes as poor BIPOC’s. Which leads to the question, why would someone as smart and sophisticated as the author deploy such a narrative? Well, let’s see.
1. Blaming race is the popular thing to do. Plenty of knowing nods and winks in the halls of academia. It’s hip to sympathize with minorities. Not so much those icky low-income people.
2. By blaming racism elites can feel good. It absolves them of blaming themselves. And isn’t feeling good really what counts?
3. Race is a splendid weapon against their opponents, who increasingly are populists demanding they share.
Well I got news. They ain’t sharing. Even if it means stooping to race hustling, the most uncivil thing you can do.
Classic divide and conquer, keep the rabble fighting amongst themselves. Though I don’t believe that is the method of this writer, he is just well versed in critical-theory speak.
That said, suicide is a tragedy, it is mostly poor people who are doing it in large part because they are poor and feeling hopeless. We could do something about that as a society but we are too enamored of the wealthy, who have used this pandemic to become much, much wealthier, spreading ever more misery in their wake. I imagine suicide and drug overdose will continue to plaque us as long as we allow the majority of Americans to sink ever deeper into poverty.
How about, instead of reflexively going “what about,” you do some research. I’d be rude and provide this via a “let me Google that for you” link, but I’m just gonna give you a relevant link so you can educate yourself. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2736599/ Feel free to look at the data in this article that shows that the average poverty level of the victims of suicide in black population is SO much worse, that there’s no good way to control for socioeconomic status so you could be even close to being justified in saying “what about white people?”
This is a very large document. Please cut and print the data showing black suicide is much worse than anyone else in the same socioeconomic status.
Seriously? I’m not going to comprehend it for you. I managed to read it, and so can you. But I’ll do you a favor and direct you to Table 1, and suggest you look at the per capita income of suicide victims who are black vs who are white. Given that the income level of black suicide victims is half of that of white suicide victims, with standard deviations that provide little overlap (that is, this data indicates that 84% of white suicide victims make more money than the AVERAGE black suicide victim), it’s unlikely you’ll be able to be able to control for income because there is simply no comparison.
Thank you. By the way, providing a quick bite from some long paper is common courtesy. Saying here, educate yourself is rude.
Now, to your comment. The fact Black suicide victims are lower income than white shouldn’t surprise anyone. Blacks are more likely to be lower income.
It’s not rude to tell someone to educate themselves if they’re obviously refusing to take the time to do so, and then wasting other peoples’ time to do it for them. You’re well out of high school. We are not being paid to funnel knowledge into your brain. Adulting requires that you educate yourself, and also requires that you do not whine when you get caught out for not doing so for yourself.
You have time to comment here, so you have time to read the same things the rest of us are reading to educate ourselves. If you don’t have time to do both, I do recommend that you prioritize the education part rather than the publishing your opinion part. It’s beyond courtesy to provide a snippet of an article for you since the article was used to support my position. I could always make up a quote from the article and you’d never know…people (mostly with right wing talking points) do that all the time. They always seem surprised when literate people argue with their false testament.
And of course it’s not surprising that there’s a discrepancy in income between black people and white people. But that discrepancy is so big that it is statistically difficult, if not impossible, to do the kind of comparison you suggest. So, your “what about white people” comment was kind of like if someone said “bighorn sheep are more likely to get concussions the larger their horns are” and you say “but what about rabbits with big horns?” Silly. Just plain silly.
No. It’s up to the person making an assertion to supply, if they wish, a succinct excerpt from a supporting document. You don’t ask someone to read though 5,000 words and then expect them to figure out which part verifies your argument. Which is what you and Mr. Booth did.
And I can’t understand your animal analogy. I will simply say, again, that when income is substituted for race, race vanishes.
“And I can’t understand your animal analogy.”
Why?
“I will simply say, again, that when income is substituted for race, race vanishes.”
Where’s your evidence? You provide NO evidence, not even the “courtesy” of a quote from a research paper you’ve identified. You can say that all you want, but if you substitute income for race, the article I provided and the table I identified indicates that the only reason race might “vanish” is because you have no white people to compare to (or at least few enough that you can’t make any conclusions–there are no rabbits with big horns). You’re simply substituting your opinion for facts, while requiring everyone else to not only provide proof, but to make it convenient for you to comprehend. But only if you feel like it. While I provide evidence that your opinion is contrary to actual facts, you fail to provide any evidence to support your opinion–just restate your opinion.
I don’t doubt that lack of money drives hopelessness, which drives suicide rates. But if the stimulus checks are at least partially responsible for an overall reduction in suicide rates, what caused the spike in suicide rates among people of color? I know that the suggestion is that it might be related to white supremacy, which I guess could be part of the problem given current events (especially in the Asian community, after being falsely being blamed for the pandemic). But it seems that if money is the cause and the cure, unless people of color were not getting the same aid (again, possible), you’d expect a similar drop in suicide rates, but the opposite is true. Is it possible that communities of color were already suffering from a level of despair that couldn’t be cured by money, and the pandemic was the straw that broke the camel’s back? Is it possible that communities of color have reduced access to the tools that might have been a lifesaver for white communities, including mental health care, broadband internet, ability to stay home/work from home?
That work from home aspect might be key. We were in the middle of a deadly crisis and we identified critical workers as those who can’t stay home and work and must be put into the line of fire, so to speak. Those workers are/were disproportionately people of color. They got no breaks, little or no reward, and we essentially told them that they WILL work, even if it kills them. And it did, for some of them. We essentially said that the only value your lives have is to serve others. And, on top of it, the badly behaved “customers” often insisted on being abusive and reckless by refusing to wear masks for the sake of others.
There definitely might be a white supremacy aspect to that, but part of it is structural racism (poverty being concentrated among people of color, and reinforced by the system’s structure), and an overall disdain for people who do essential jobs. Part of the argument against increasing a minimum wage is that “those jobs” weren’t meant to survive off of – you should get an education, you should work harder, you should “better” yourself – despite the fact that “those jobs” ensure that those who do the “good jobs” can continue to do so with minimal discomfort. And if everyone did work to get “good jobs,” no one would be left to do “those jobs.” And we’d all be screwed.
Anyway, these are just my musings. I don’t have time to do a ton of research on this, but it struck me that the article didn’t close any loops or provide any real insight into the disparity between the overall suicide rates and the spike in suicides in certain groups of people.
Suicide among Native Americans is more prevalent than in any other racial or ethnic group in the United States. Reservation suicide is associated with alcohol abuse, drug abuse, tobacco use, and a sense of hopelessness.
If you want to see people living as wards of the state and where people are either sitting around doing nothing or working at the only jobs available … with the government, come visit our reservations. You’ll be inspired.
“This confirms our understanding of the role of white supremacy/privilege”
This is how I dealt with “white supremacy:” My first job right out of the Navy was for a local computer equipment manufacturer, teaching their field service engineers how to maintain their customers’ computer equipment. After about a week on the job, my boss, a very nice fellow by the way, said to me, “You know, you’re pretty smart for an Indian.” Three years later he was working for me.
If there ever was a year of challenges, this last couple have been doozies.
Hopelessness and depression rise when ones friends and relatives are getting sick and dying. The same happens while political fighting grows worse and many seek to blame others or gain political advantage from the misery.
But after Mike Brown was left to lie dead in that Missouri street for so long– after a vigilante shot Travon Martin dead and was not charged, after Tamir Rice was killed playing with a fake gun, after Freddie Gray died in a police paddy wagon ride, after Eric Garner, after Sandra Bland, Laquan McDonald, Amaud Arbery, George Floyd, Daunte Wright, Breonna Taylor…
Many school shootings, gang stray bullets killing little children and some people even in their homes… Kyle Rittenouse…
Many people are sensitive and cannot effectively process the nearly constant videos of violence, the long time it takes to bring people to justice, the flaws in the justice, and the pain that it all causes to these same individuals and families–
It would say more, if after all the violent witnessing of events of these last years, there WEREN’T more folks looking to find a way out of the pain. Despair is a normal reaction to senseless and persistent violence.