Child suicide rates during the COVID-19 pandemic in England.

ABSTRACT:

Background

There is concern about the impact of COVID-19, and the control measures to prevent the spread, on children's mental health. The aim of this work was to identify if there had been a rise of childhood suicide during the COVID pandemic.

Method

Using data from England's National Child Mortality Database (NCMD) the characteristics and rates of children dying of suicide between April and December 2020 were compared with those in 2019. In a subset (1st January to 17th May 2020) further characteristics and possible contributing factors were obtained.

Results

A total of 193 likely childhood deaths by suicide were reported. There was no evidence overall suicide deaths were higher in 2020 than 2019 (RR 1.09 (0.80-1.48), p = 0.584) but weak evidence that the rat

SUBMITTER: Odd D 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8604801 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature