Nearly 10% of young women had suicidal thoughts in 2021

This is a sad record that France holds: the rate of deaths by suicide is “significantly higher than the European Union average”, indicated in 2020 the National Suicide Observatory. In 2019, 8,366 deaths by suicide were recorded in our country, or 13.07 per 100,000 inhabitants compared to 10.15 on average in Europe. Since then, the health crisis has had a significant impact on the mental health of children and adolescents. But it has also done its work among young adults: a study by Public Health France (SPF) published this Monday shows a significant increase in suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts in 2021 among 18-24 year olds, particularly among young women. .

Thus, 9.4% of young women questioned by the health agency declared having had suicidal thoughts during the year. A figure that has been rising constantly since 2014 (they were then 3.3%), which accelerated between 2020 and 2021. Among men in the same age group, after a sharp increase between 2017 and 2020 (of 3. 6 to 7.1%), we observe a slight decrease in 2021 (5%). Suicide attempts over the course of their lives follow the same pattern: if in 2014 8.4% of young women declared at least one in their life, this was 12.8% in 2021; young men were 2.7% in 2017, 5.9% in 2020, and about the same in 2021.

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In total, write the authors of this study published in the Weekly Epidemiology Bulletin, “suicidal thoughts have more than doubled since 2014 among 18-24 year olds (...), suicide attempts declared during the life increased by 50% compared to 2017 (...) and those declared over the last 12 months, by more than 60%.

On the other hand, all age groups combined in the entire population surveyed (25,514 people aged 18 to 85 living in mainland France, and 6,519 in the overseas departments and regions), the figures remain rather stable: in 2021, 4.2% of 18-85 year olds said they had thought about committing suicide in the last 12 months, 6.8% reported an attempt in their lifetime and 0.5% in the past year.

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The results are relatively similar from one region to another, except for Guadeloupe and Réunion which reported fewer suicidal thoughts (2.4 and 2.9% respectively).

This study “confirms the deterioration in the mental health of young adults observed elsewhere based on emergency room and hospitalization data,” write the authors. They carried out their study based on the 2021 edition of the Public Health France Health Barometer, which has surveyed representative samples of French people at regular intervals for twenty-five years to “better know and understand health attitudes and behaviors”. Telephone numbers (landline and mobile) are generated at random, the methodology making it possible to obtain a representative sample of the population, subject to a questionnaire lasting around thirty minutes.

For this survey, the authors were interested in four main elements: the presence of suicidal thoughts in the last 12 months (and the fact of having or not talked about it to those around you), suicide attempts (during the life and in the past year), the use of care after the last attempt, and finally the intentionality of the author (to know if he was determined to die, or considers that his attempt was a call for help) .

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“The high prevalence of suicide attempts and suicidal ideation observed among young adults constitutes an important change since they were lower than or comparable to other age groups of the population in the health barometers which preceded the Covid-19 pandemic. 19,” warn the authors. Data which echoes the widely reported observation of a “greater deterioration in the mental health of young people following the Covid-19 pandemic” and data collected in emergency services.

The latter “testify to the fact that this deterioration is long-term, with an even higher number of visits to emergency rooms for suicidal ideas and gestures in 2022 and 2023 than in 2021”. The Escapad survey, carried out among 17-year-olds, had shown the same pattern among adolescents, recall the authors, with “a sharp increase in suicidal thoughts over the last 12 months (18.0% of young people in 2022 compared to 11.4% in 2017), as well as a slight increase in suicide attempts leading to hospitalization (3.3% of young people in 2022 compared to 2.9% in 2017).

Also read: Worrying increase in suicide attempts among young people

However, these increases could also be partially attributable to an “opening of the floor on mental health issues.” The study shows in fact, “which is a very positive result from the point of view of preventive behavior”, a significant increase in the percentage of people saying they had talked about their suicidal thoughts: this was the case for less than half of people concerned in 2017, but more than 65% of them in 2021.

However, progress remains to be made in care: all ages combined, “a little less than six people in ten who attempted suicide (57%) felt they had received the support necessary to cope during their last attempt of suicide.

Launched on October 1, 2021, the telephone number 31.14 allows you, 24/7, to find help from health professionals trained in the assessment and management of suicidal crises, free and confidential.