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NYTIMES: Surge of Student Suicides Pushes Las Vegas Schools to Reopen
#1
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/24/us/po...virus.html?

"Firmly linking teen suicides to school closings is difficult, but rising mental health emergencies and suicide rates point to the toll the pandemic lockdown is taking."
...

"This fall, when most school districts decided not to reopen, more parents began to speak out. The parents of a 14-year-old boy in Maryland who killed himself in October described how their son “gave up” after his district decided not to return in the fall. In December, an 11-year-old boy in Sacramento shot himself during his Zoom class. Weeks later, the father of a teenager in Maine attributed his son’s suicide to the isolation of the pandemic."

...

"President Biden has laid out a robust plan to speed vaccinations, expand coronavirus testing and spend billions of dollars to help districts reopen most of their schools in his first 100 days in office.

By then, children in districts like Clark County, with more than 300,000 students, will have been out of school for more than a year."


"His mother, Pamela, did not know whether quarantine pushed him over the edge, but she said: “Our kids are feeling hopeless. They’re feeling like there’s no future for them. I can’t see how there’s any other explanation.”

In November, school officials intervened when a 12-year-old student searched his district-issued iPad for “how to make a noose.”

The boy’s father had retired to bed around 7 p.m. to rest for his 2 a.m. work shift. He did not hear the phone ringing until around 10 p.m., when the school district finally reached him. His father made it to his son’s room to find a noose from multiple shoestrings around his neck.

His grandson, whose dog died during the pandemic, was doing well academically in virtual school but was “Zoomed out,” Larry said. The only indication the boy has given for what pushed him over the edge is saying repeatedly, “I miss my friends.”"
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#2
(01-24-2021, 05:55 AM)Snorlax94 Wrote: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/24/us/po...virus.html?

"Firmly linking teen suicides to school closings is difficult, but rising mental health emergencies and suicide rates point to the toll the pandemic lockdown is taking."
...

"This fall, when most school districts decided not to reopen, more parents began to speak out. The parents of a 14-year-old boy in Maryland who killed himself in October described how their son “gave up” after his district decided not to return in the fall. In December, an 11-year-old boy in Sacramento shot himself during his Zoom class. Weeks later, the father of a teenager in Maine attributed his son’s suicide to the isolation of the pandemic."

...

"President Biden has laid out a robust plan to speed vaccinations, expand coronavirus testing and spend billions of dollars to help districts reopen most of their schools in his first 100 days in office.

By then, children in districts like Clark County, with more than 300,000 students, will have been out of school for more than a year."


"His mother, Pamela, did not know whether quarantine pushed him over the edge, but she said: “Our kids are feeling hopeless. They’re feeling like there’s no future for them. I can’t see how there’s any other explanation.”

In November, school officials intervened when a 12-year-old student searched his district-issued iPad for “how to make a noose.”

The boy’s father had retired to bed around 7 p.m. to rest for his 2 a.m. work shift. He did not hear the phone ringing until around 10 p.m., when the school district finally reached him. His father made it to his son’s room to find a noose from multiple shoestrings around his neck.

His grandson, whose dog died during the pandemic, was doing well academically in virtual school but was “Zoomed out,” Larry said. The only indication the boy has given for what pushed him over the edge is saying repeatedly, “I miss my friends.”"
Thanks for posting. A kid from the local high school took their own life a couple of weeks back. Get the kids back in school. Get them back in sports. When this is all said and done, the lockdowns will have killed more kids than the disease.
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#3
There are many sad stories this year. Suicides are always sad stories. How does one compare M sad stories vs N sad stories?

The CDC only has suicide statistics up to 1Q 2020. The closest I can get to any aggregate number is Natural Deaths versus other deaths through November 2020.

Taking the 11 months of 2020 data and adjusting it to a full year, estimates 2,996,842 natural deaths and 254,971 other deaths (murders, suicides, accidental deaths). For a full 2019 year, there were 2,607,093 natural deaths and 253,761 other deaths. So, the estimate for 2020 deaths exceed 2019 deaths by 361,749 natural deaths (up 13.88%) and 1,210 other deaths (0.48%). Population growth from 2019 to 2020 was about 0.35%. So Other deaths is up about 0.13% per capita, while natural deaths is up 13.5%.

The fact that this increase in other deaths is so small surprises me. I had previously seen evidence that murders and violent crimes are up. Likely accidental deaths (involving traffic) are down significantly. I haven't seen numeric data for suicides but I wouldn't be surprised if it is up, but I don't know how much.
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#4
Suicides were lower in 2020 than in 2017, 2018, or 2019.   The numbers are not in for 2021.
More info from the CDC.

I would not want to credit the pandemic and subsequent stay-at-home situations with the decrease, but I'd certainly hesitate to say the pandemic increased suicides.
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#5
There has been a lot of misinformation about suicides that has been pushed to justify reopening schools. NYT is one of the biggest culprits. Tyler Black is a suicidologist who has been doing his best to debunk this information. If anything, school closings likely decreased the incidence of youth suicides. Anyway, here's a great thread on the topic: https://twitter.com/tylerblack32/status/...2849989633
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#6
Thanks. I wouldn't have seen this. The statistics he presents are very illuminating. I'd like to see references so I can verify they're right. I presume these reflect time of death, which we equate with the act of suicide, rather than the time of the event that results in the death.

It is very clear that he thinks the suicides are associated with school days (versus, say, be inversely related to days of the week that begin with "S"). He then seems to think there is a causal relation, which, IMO, may or may not be true.

I would expect there are at least 4 factors on the timing of suicides.
1) External pressure 2) Emotional state, 3) Trigger, 4) Opportunity
and maybe a fifth 5) Lack of distracting/ameliorating influences

Weekdays are not only school days, but they are time periods when
1) the child transitions from one caregiver (parents/home) to another (teacher(s)/school), including a time when the child may be under neither's care.
2) the parents have external requirements (work) and pressures. They may pass stress on to the children in their care either directly (for instance, yelling) or indirectly (not being there for the children).
3) the child may have access to the means of suicide, whether gun, medicines, or vehicles.
4) the looseness of a weekend schedule transitions to the tightness of an externally-mandated schedule
5) the child may have more freedom of choice (movement, what to do, ...), which is part of growing up and maturing, but can lead to bad, even fatal, decisions en route.

His recommendations about school seem to be based on his opinions (and mostly related to perceived stress), not on data. (One thing he didn't include in the list of characteristics of school days was the amount of sleep.) [That is not meant to criticize his recommendations, but to recognize them for what they are.]

I think US society has chosen that mass-educating (as in assembly line) children is the norm. I personally would consider rethinking that (I definitely do not believe in using school teachers (versus parents) to teach their school-board approved/mandated version of morality to children), but I wouldn't advocate any drastic changes in any short term period.


Related to COVID, my concern about the return to school was the high rate of passing infections from family to family through the soup of kids at school, resulting in wide-spread infection. But it seems the US society (for the most) and governments have chosen the rather laissez-faire approach to COVID, and we have gone down the road, with no way back, of wide-spread infection and all that means for us in the short and long term.
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