USA — Army Releases July Suicide Data

The Army released sui­cide data today for the month of July. Among active-duty sol­diers, there were 12 poten­tial sui­cides: three were con­firmed as sui­cides, and nine remain under inves­ti­ga­tion. For June, the Army report­ed 21 poten­tial sui­cides among active-duty sol­diers. Since the release of that report, 10 have been con­firmed as sui­cides, and 11 remain under investigation. 

Dur­ing July 2010, among reserve com­po­nent sol­diers who were not on active duty, there were 15 poten­tial sui­cides. For June, among that same group, there were 11 sui­cides. Of those, five were con­firmed as sui­cides and six are pend­ing deter­mi­na­tion of the man­ner of death. 

“Sui­cide pre­ven­tion is much more than thwart­ing that last final act of des­per­a­tion. It is increas­ing aware­ness and edu­ca­tion in order to pre­clude mem­bers of the Army fam­i­ly from ever get­ting to the point where sui­cide might be con­sid­ered an alter­na­tive to ask­ing for help,” said Col. Chris Philbrick, direc­tor, Army Sui­cide Pre­ven­tion Task Force. 

“The Army Health Pro­mo­tion, Risk Reduc­tion and Sui­cide Pre­ven­tion Report released last month is the result of a 15-month effort to bet­ter under­stand high-risk behav­ior and sui­cides in the Army. The report is intend­ed to inform and edu­cate on the impor­tance of rec­og­niz­ing and reduc­ing high-risk behav­ior relat­ed to sui­cide and acci­den­tal death, and reduc­ing the stig­ma asso­ci­at­ed with seek­ing behav­ioral health treat­ment,” Philbrick said. 

Sol­diers and fam­i­lies in need of cri­sis assis­tance can con­tact Mil­i­tary One­Source or the Defense Cen­ter of Excel­lence (DCoE) for Psy­cho­log­i­cal Health and Trau­mat­ic Brain Injury Out­reach Cen­ter. Trained con­sul­tants are avail­able from both orga­ni­za­tions 24 hours a day, sev­en days a week, and 365 days a year. 

The Mil­i­tary One­Source toll-free num­ber for those resid­ing in the con­ti­nen­tal Unit­ed States is 1–800-342‑9647; their Web site address is http://www.militaryonesource.com . Over­seas per­son­nel should refer to the Mil­i­tary One­Source Web site for dial­ing instruc­tions for their spe­cif­ic location. 

Source:
U.S. Depart­ment of Defense
Office of the Assis­tant Sec­re­tary of Defense (Pub­lic Affairs) 

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