Reactive surveillance of suicides during the COVID-19 pandemic in France, 2020 to March 2022.

ABSTRACT:

Aims

Mitigation actions during the COVID-19 pandemic may impact mental health and suicide in general populations. We aimed to analyse the evolution in suicide deaths from 2020 to March 2022 in France.

Methods

Using free-text medical causes in death certificates, we built an algorithm, which aimed to identify suicide deaths. We measured its retrospective performances by comparing suicide deaths identified using the algorithm with deaths which had either a Tenth revision of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) code for 'intentional self-harm' or for 'external cause of undetermined intent' as the underlying cause. The number of suicide deaths from January 2020 to March 2022 was then compared with the expected number estimated using a generalized additive model.

SUBMITTER: Fouillet A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10130823 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature