Climbing suicide rates--what is happening?

One of the readers of this blog sent me a note a few days ago posing the following questions,

Do the military medical services still lack the capacity to adequately treat mental problems? As a PTSD sufferer myself I can certainly attest to this paucity of care in the past, but I had believed improvements had been made. Was I wrong?

Is he wrong? Sadly, I must say he is. There are many sides to this tale…

The Army Vice Chief of Staff, General Peter Chiarelli told the Associated Press that the Army believes there have been 140 active duty soldiers who have taken their own life. He says that is the same as all of 2008, but the 2009 is not over yet.

The other important point here is that this is the fifth year in a row that the number of suicides has exceeded the previous year. There were 102 suicides in 2006, 115 in 2007 and 140 in 2008. And keep in mind these are deaths of active duty soldiers. While the numbers are somewhat “foggy”, the Centers for Disease Control say that there may be as many as 18 veterans a day who take their own lives—that’s 6,500 a year. What makes this number “foggy” is that it includes veterans from all wars. The Department of Veterans Affairs says that 144 veterans out of 500,000 who served between 2002 and 2005 have taken their lives.

Marines have not fared any better and, as a matter of fact, their numbers may be worse. As of September of this year, 38 Marines have taken their lives and if the continue doing so at this rate, the Marine Corps is facing a 20% increase in suicides. One Marine report noted that less than 42% of those killing themselves since 2001 had any history of a deployment to one of the war zones. But in the last two year, some 70% of the 80 Marines who have committed suicide had a history of a deployment. The rate of suicides in the Army was 61% in 2008.
While the Marines say they can’t pinpoint the cause for the increase in suicides, I strongly believe that the pressure of increased OPTEMPO and PERSTEMPO are wreaking havoc on morale of our service personnel. Commander Aaron Werbel, the suicide prevention program manager for the Marine Corps says he believes increased operational tempo is a contributing factor. Commander Werbel is a Navy Medical Service Corps officer with a PhD in clinical psychology.
The Navy and Air Force suicides rates have been a little better, but even those rates, around 11 per 100,000, have resulted in the loss 38 airmen and 41 sailors in 2008.
There are two interesting documents found at these links.

http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2009/03/airforce_suicide_032309w/

http://www.hhs.gov/asl/testify/2009/03/t20090318a.html

The first is an article from a March 2009 edition of the Air Force Times. The second is the prepared testimony of Kathryn A. Power, Director of the Center for Mental Health Services, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services of the Department of Health and Human Services before the United States SenateCommittee on Armed Services Subcommittee on Personnel. Her testimony concerns what the Services, the Department of Veterans Affairs and DHHS are doing to help reduce the numbers of suicides among active duty personnel and veterans.

While I cannot say all is well to the reader who asked me about the state of mental health care, I can say that the Services, the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Health and Human Services are making many efforts. Of course, finding a way to honorably get out of Iraq and Afghanistan would perhaps go a long ways toward solving some of the problems.