Thinking of the theme song for M*A*S*H…..
But on a more serious note…..suicides among our service people is not getting better……https://lobotero.com/2019/06/24/suicides/
In the 4 months since I wrote my last post on this subject the figures are looking worse…….
Looks like the US Navy could set a new all-time high for suicides…..
A total of 53 active-duty and seven reserve sailors have died by suicide so far this year, and that is “roughly a little bit ahead” of the number of sailors who had taken their own lives this time in 2018, the Navy’s top suicide prevention officer said.
“That trend is unacceptable,” Rear Adm. Philip Sobeck, director, 21st Century Sailor, told reporters on Thursday. “We are looking at every aspect of why that trend continues, at least for the last three years. We’re determined not to allow it to continue the way it’s going.”
Last year, Navy suicides reached their highest level since the service began recording data on the matter in 2006, with 68 active-duty sailors and 11 sailors in the Navy Reserve dying by suicide.
https://taskandpurpose.com/navy-suicides-new-record
And unfortunately the US Navy is not alone in this…..
The rate of suicide among active duty service members has increased significantly over the past five years, according to a Pentagon report released on Thursday.
The report comes after three U.S. sailors assigned to the aircraft carrier George H.W. Bush died by apparent suicide last week, incidents the Navy has said are separate and unrelated.
The Pentagon’s first annual suicide report said that the rate of suicide deaths among active duty service members was 24.8 per 100,000 service members, up from just under 20 per 100,000 in 2013. In 2018, 541 service members died by suicide, the report said, adding that the most common method of suicide was with firearms.
The active duty trooper is not alone…the National Guard has also seen a rise……
The National Guard’s suicide rate has surpassed the entire active-duty force and the reserves, as well as the civilian population.
30.6 people of every 100,000 in the National Guard died by suicide in 2018, the Pentagon’s first-ever Annual Suicide Report for 2018 said, compared to 24.8 active-duty service members, and 22.9 reservists.
https://taskandpurpose.com/national-guard-pentagon-suicide-report
Families are also not immune…..
In what was hailed as the Pentagon’s first-ever report on military family suicides, the Defense Department said Thursday that 123 spouses and 63 children took their own lives in 2017.
According to the inaugural Department of Defense 2018 Annual Suicide Report, the 186 deaths included 122 among of active-duty personnel families, 29 among Reserve families and 35 within National Guard families.
This is a sad turn and it just keeps getting worse…..maybe the military should go about trying to find a cause and a good treatment to prevent our brave service people from feeling like they need to oft themselves.
Then there are those that try to make suicide painless……
Opponents of euthanasia have expressed concern at the creation of a “suicide machine”, which has been developed by Dr Philip Nitschke.
The well-known advocate of individuals’ right to die has regularly caused controversy by assisting what he calls “rational suicides”.
Having developed machines in the past that could be used by individuals to inject themselves with lethal doses of barbiturates, Dr Nitschke says he is now close to finalising a new device which uses nitrogen gas to cause death.
He says the idea for the invention was sparked by conversations in 2012 over the case of British man Tony Nicklinson, who suffered from locked-in syndrome – the result of a severe stroke in 2005 that had left him unable to speak or move.
Mr Nicklinson fought a long, and ultimately unsuccessful, court battle in a bid to allow his doctors legally to assist his suicide. In search of assisted suicide options, his lawyer reached out to Dr Nitschke, who began to consider how it would be possible for an individual whose movements were limited to blinking might be able to trigger death without the need for help by others.
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I can understand our military suicides. They are short-handed, overworked, but still held to the highest standards – one mistake and everyone jumps down their throat with investigations and court martial. I think renewing the draft would help alleviate their problems and help the current generation to grow-up!
I use to be against the draft….but these days I think it is needed……that shared experience thing that makes Americans great. chuq
Exactly. And our youth will learn discipline – that which I rarely seen taught by parents these days.
So true…..have a good Saturday….chuq
Before you go…. in the event you did not discover yet, that soldier KIA at Fort Polk has been identified as Major Trevor Joseph, Collierville, TN; 1/5th Aviation Regiment.
I had not read about his death……I did see there was a death at Fort Carson….thanx for the update chuq
We had a spate of suicides at Army training camps a while back. They cited bullying of new recruits as the cause. I wonder if someone outside of the military needs to take a look at the reasons behind the worrying increase over there?
Best wishes, Pete.
I hate to say this but it appears as if the suicides are the “price of doing business” sort of thing…..chuq
Rate is not much higher than the general population. More males than females. Always an un-needed and tragic loss to families, friends, and the individual.
The DoD needs to get a handle on this…..for mental health of the soldiers should be paramount….chuq