USA — Army Releases June Suicide Data

The Army released sui­cide data today for the month of June. Among active duty sol­diers, there were 21 poten­tial sui­cides: one was con­firmed as a sui­cide, and 20 remain under inves­ti­ga­tion. For May, the Army report­ed 10 poten­tial sui­cides among active duty sol­diers. Since the release of that report, four have been con­firmed as sui­cides, and six remain under inves­ti­ga­tion.

Dur­ing June 2010, among reserve com­po­nent sol­diers who were not on active duty, there were 11 poten­tial sui­cides: one was con­firmed as sui­cide, and 10 remain under inves­ti­ga­tion. For May, among that same group, there were 13 total sui­cides. Of those, two were con­firmed as sui­cides and 11 are pend­ing deter­mi­na­tion of the man­ner of death. 

For ref­er­ence, the Army’s total for the first half of cal­en­dar year 2009 was 88 for active duty and 42 for reserve com­po­nent sol­diers who were not on active duty. For the first half of 2010, the totals were 80 for active duty and 65 for reserve com­po­nent sol­diers who were not on active duty. 

“Our sui­cide pre­ven­tion efforts must con­tin­ue to be direct­ed at all mem­bers of the Army fam­i­ly – our sol­diers, Depart­ment of the Army civil­ians and fam­i­lies – dur­ing the busy sum­mer­time tran­si­tion peri­od,” said Col. Chris Philbrick, direc­tor, Army Sui­cide Pre­ven­tion Task Force. “The cru­cial ele­ments are still car­ing, con­cern and deci­sive lead­er­ship. There will nev­er be a sub­sti­tute for a non­com­mis­sioned offi­cer, first-line super­vi­sor or friend who knows when a per­son is suf­fer­ing and has the moral courage to act and get that indi­vid­ual the help they need. That abil­i­ty to make a pos­i­tive dif­fer­ence is the best method to ren­der effec­tive sui­cide pre­ven­tion in the Army,” 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, 7 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. The Army’s com­pre­hen­sive list of Sui­cide Pre­ven­tion Pro­gram infor­ma­tion is locat­ed at http://www.armyg1.army.mil/hr/suicide/default.asp .

Army lead­ers can access cur­rent health pro­mo­tion guid­ance in new­ly revised Army Reg­u­la­tion 600–63 (Health Pro­mo­tion) at:
http://www.army.mil/usapa/epubs/pdf/r600_63.pdf and Army Pam­phlet 600–24 (Health Pro­mo­tion, Risk Reduc­tion and Sui­cide Pre­ven­tion) at http://www.army.mil/usapa/epubs/pdf/p600_24.pdf .

Sui­cide pre­ven­tion train­ing resources for Army fam­i­lies can be accessed at http://www.armyg1.army.mil/hr/suicide/training_sub.asp?sub_cat=20 (requires Army Knowl­edge Online access to down­load materials). 

The DCoE Out­reach Cen­ter can be con­tact­ed at 1–866-966‑1020, via elec­tron­ic mail at Resources@DCoEOutreach.org and at http://www.dcoe.health.mil .

Infor­ma­tion about the Army’s Com­pre­hen­sive Sol­dier Fit­ness Pro­gram is locat­ed at http://www.army.mil/csf .

Amer­i­can Foun­da­tion for Sui­cide Pre­ven­tion: http://www.afsp.org .

Sui­cide Pre­ven­tion Resource Coun­cil: http://www.sprc.org/index.asp .

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