USA – The rising rate of suicide cases among military personnel has nothing to do with their overseas deployment in support of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. A published study in “The Journal of the American Medical Association” has established. Instead, the study has revealed that the service members who had left the military after a short period of service had the higher risk of suicide than those that had served for 4years and more.
The study indicated that traditionally, there were more suicide cases with the general population than within the US military service members. However, this is not the case in more with the current suicidal cases that have risen sharply almost getting to the double of those in the Army and Marine Corps.
The study which is said to be one of the most comprehensive studies examining suicide risks related to deployment, researchers used data on suicide mortality within the period October 7th, 2001 to December 31st, 2009. There had been a notion that anyone who had been deployed to Iraq was at risk of suicide hence the researchers used a sample of all 3.9 million personnel who had served in the US military during Operation Enduring Freedom.
Some of the explanations the researchers gave as to why there were more suicide cases among those who had served in the military for a short time included; loss of a shared military identity, transition to and from military life as well as difficulty in finding work especially if they had not left in an honorable manner.
Other scenarios that would have contributed to early discharge from military and which may largely have contributed to suicide among the military men and women would include mental disorders, legal problems as well as medical conditions including disability.
This has been described as a large study since it targets the military personnel that served in the Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom campaigns. The authors were however quick to mention that some suicide cases may have been misclassified.