Navy suicides

Could there be a problem?

A "Puzzling Problem"

Is that what we’re calling it?

Suicides among active-duty soldiers in July more than doubled from June, accelerating a trend throughout the military this year that has prompted Pentagon leaders to redouble efforts to solve a puzzling problem.

The Army, which is the only branch of the military that issues monthly press statements on suicides, said 26 active-duty soldiers killed themselves in July, compared to 12 in June. The July total was the highest for any month since the Army began keeping such statistics, according to Lt. Col. Lisa Garcia, an Army spokeswoman.

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Of the 26 active-duty soldiers who committed suicide in July, all were male and only two were officers, according to figures provided by the Army's office of public affairs. Thirteen were married, 10 were single and three were divorced. A breakdown of the deployment history of 14 of the 26 showed that six had never been deployed, seven had been deployed between one and three times, and one had been deployed six times.

  Yahoo

I Knew It Was Bad, But...

The number of suicides among active duty U.S. troops has risen dramatically over the first five months of 2012 compared to the same period in years past, averaging just under one each day, according to an analysis by the Associated Press.

In the first 155 days of the year, there were 154 military suicides, the highest total in 10 years. That total represents an 18 percent increase over last year, when the military saw 130 suicides over the same period, and it’s a 25 percent increase from 2010.

Those totals include only troops who were currently serving, and not veterans who had returned to their private lives.

The number of self-inflicted fatalities  in 2012 also tops the total number of servicemen and women who’ve been killed in combat in Afghanistan this year by about 50 percent, according to data also obtained by the Associated Press.

  Raw Story

Support Our Troops

The number of suicides in the US Army rose by 80 percent after the United States launched the war on Iraq, American military doctors reported on Thursday.

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In 2008, 140 army personnel committed suicide, a figure 80 percent higher than in 2004 [...] and much higher than in civilian society, it found.

  Raw Story

A report published not in the US, but in the British journal Injury Prevention.