The relationship between a comprehensive index of prosperity and suicide rates in former Soviet countries, including a comparison with European and Asian countries: Discussion from a new perspective.

Investigations of suicide in countries of the former Soviet Union, which broke into 15 different countries in the early 1990s, require examinations of a combination of economic, social, and health factors. It is important to address these factors individually and to examine the various composite indicators for each. Moreover, it would be worthwhile to explore the potential applicability of a comprehensive worldwide index. We analyzed data from nine of the former Soviet countries for which both the annual suicide rate and the Global Competitiveness Index (GCI) were available for the years 2006-2017. We determined the precise relationships between the suicide rate and the GCI during this period in these nine countries as well as in nine countries with high suicide rates in Europe and Asia. The results indicated the following: (i) In six of the nine former Soviet countries with complete data, the suicide rate showed a relationship with the GCI. Notably, this relationship was inverse in all but one country. (ii) Among the nine European and Asian countries with high suicide rates, three exhibited a correlation between the suicide rate and the GCI. Measures to prevent suicide should be devised especially in countries of the former Soviet Union through collaboration among multiple fields and organizations, as necessary, with particular attention paid to countries with worse or worsening GCI values.

Is the Association between Suicide and Unemployment Common or Different among the Post-Soviet Countries?

The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) collapsed in 1991 and separated into the 15 post-Soviet countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. The post-Soviet countries have faced many economic problems, including unemployment. The association between suicide and unemployment in post-Soviet countries has not been well studied. Here, we researched the annual suicide rate and the unemployment rate during the 28-year period from 1992 to 2019 in the 15 post-Soviet countries. We calculated the correlation coefficients between the suicide rate and the unemployment rate in each of the countries during this period, and we determined the association between the suicide rate and unemployment rate. Our major findings were that (1) the suicide rates among both males and females were significantly associated with the unemployment rate in nearly half of the 15 countries, and (2) for nearly 70% of the males in the entire set of 15 countries, there was an association between the suicide rate and the unemployment rate. Suicide-prevention researchers and organizations should be aware of our findings, and specific suicide-prevention measures based on these results are desirable.