The Northern Health Authority had the highest rate of suicide deaths in the province in 2017.
Numbers were released by the BC Coroners Service this week.
“The North does have a rate of 18 deaths per 100-thousand people which is higher than that provincial average, which is around 11.5 deaths by suicide,” said Andy Watson, BC Coroner Service’s Manager of Strategic Communications. “Both the Northern Health Authority region and Interior region are the highest reporting health authorities.”
Watson says while suicides are down province-wide, from more than 600 in the previous three years to 572 in 2017, the opposite can be said for our region.
“Overall, we’ve seen a reduction in the urban areas of British Columbia, but certainly in more rural areas, including the communities in the Northern Health Authority, we’ve actually seen the highest levels in terms of the 2017 data detected in the Northern Health Authority relative to the rest of the province.”
Watson adds that trends appear to continue with males accounting for three-quarters of the suicides in 2017.
Just four percent involved those 18 and under.
According to the BC Coroners Service, the most common means of suicide deaths were hanging (225), involving firearms (97), and poisoning (84).
Watson did explain to MyPGNow as to the process of collecting this data, as well as explaining the gap between the recent release of 2017 data and more current information.
“Every death that’s sudden, unexpected, or unnatural in the province is something that’s investigated by the BC Coroners Service, and these investigations take time. The reason that the data is from 2017 is that we have to wait for a certain percentage of investigations to close before we’re able to make a firm statement around what’s happening.”
Acquiring information from other agencies can also delay the Service’s process, ultimately aiming for the utmost amount of accuracy in the data they’re releasing.
With files from George Henderson, MyCaribooNow