Suicide In Africa Research Articles

Identification of Suicidal Ideation and Support for Families in Sub-Saharan Africa

Over 77% of global suicides related to life stress in 2019 occurred in low-income and middle-income countries. However, few studies in sub-Saharan Africa have focused on mental health and suicidal behaviors. Less than 10% of African countries have reported suicide rates (WHO, 2021). This article intends to raise awareness of the current global problem of suicide, especially in Africa, and its impact on families in Africa. This includes the pervasive nature of suicidal behavior and how it has been addressed in various parts of Africa. This research established that multiple studies from outside Africa, including high-income countries, address suicide symptoms and treatment. However, discussing this topic within an African cultural context is necessary. Psychoeducation and innovations such as telepsychiatry increase public awareness and access to services, and are essential aspects of addressing the problem of suicide in Africa. Family support, suicide prevention strategies, and psychotherapeutic interventions may also provide critical assistance before and during crises. This research highlights a traditionally taboo subject in sub-Saharan Africa, attempts to destigmatize it, and includes care, recommendations, and family coping skills.

Covariation of suicide and HIV in 186 countries: a spatial autoregressive and multiscale geographically weighted regression analyses

Suicide is one of the leading causes of death globally, inherently linked with mental health conditions. Existing studies have also found a significant association between suicide and chronic health conditions such as human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Although there have been enormous studies on these global health issues, knowledge about their co-existence is elusive. This paper examines the link between HIV and suicide in 186 countries using geospatial techniques and spatial statistics. We used country-level suicide and HIV data obtained from the United Nations Development Program database. The local bivariate spatial association technique was used to determine the covariation of HIV and suicide, while autoregressive models were used to estimate the unexplained country-level variables in the model. Due to evidence of spatial dependencies, we applied multiscale geographically weighted regression (MGWR) to examine the spatial variation in the predictor variables. The local bivariate spatial association technique was used to determine the covariation of HIV and suicide. Analysis indicated that HIV significantly covaried with suicide in regions of Africa and Europe. Our result suggests that HIV is a significant driver of suicide among females in sub-Saharan Africa while it drives suicide among males in many regions including the country of South Africa, Lesotho, Swaziland, Oceania, and Southeast Asia. MGWR indicated that HIV was negatively associated with suicide in the Americas and European countries, but positively associated with suicide in Africa, the Middle East, and Oceania. There is a double burden of HIV and suicide in sub-Saharan Africa. Therefore, investment in both mental healthcare and access to antiretroviral drugs is essential in reducing suicide at both global and local levels.

Religious Views on Suicide Among the Baganda, Uganda: A Qualitative Study

Relatively little research has been conducted on religion and suicide in Africa, yet religion has a lot of influence on people's way of life in Africa. To study religious views on suicide among the Baganda, Uganda, we used grounded theory and discourse analysis on a total of 28 focus groups and 30 key informant interviews. Suicide is largely seen as a breach of God's doctrine life is sacred, God's commandment thou shall not kill, and God's rule of agape. The study also focuses on the consequences of breaching God's divine providence: punishment from God and the Church. Religion still has a lot of influence on people's views on suicide in Uganda despite the challenges highlighted in the study. A recommendation from these results is that suicide prevention should cater to divergent views on religion and suicide. More qualitative research should be conducted in this area to facilitate theoretical comparison with this study.

Suicide in Late Colonial Africa: The Evidence of Inquests from Nyasaland

IN THE EXTENSIVE LITERATURE on the history of suicide, the societies of the African continent barely feature, except in brief discussions of folk beliefs and practices.1 A simple explanation for the relative lack of attention given to this issue is that historically African societies have been assumed to have very low rates of suicide. But that assumption itself needs historicizing. The statistical evidence for suicide in most African countries is extremely weak, and longitudinal data is almost nonexistent, so while there are reasons to suggest the need for a reevaluation of suicide rates in Africa, it is not currently possible to provide one. However, the intellectual history of suicide in Africa can shed light on the issue, as can some evidence from the British colony of Nyasaland (now Malawi) in the late colonial period. In contemporary southern and eastern Africa, concerns over apparently rising suicide rates are being expressed both by mental health professionals and in the popular press. It is tempting to argue that these parts of Africa are experiencing the equivalent of the intensification of anxiety about suicide that surfaced periodically in early modern and nineteenth-century Europe—a kind of “moral panic.”2 As in

Perspectives on suicide in Africa

Suicide is a serious worldwide health problem, particularly among youths. It is defined as the intentional act of killing oneself. Analytically, the suicidal act entails: the wish to kill, the wish to be killed and the wish to die. People who die by suicide know what they are doing and are aware of the consequences of their actions. A completed suicidal act is a complex phenomenon associated with psychological, biological and social factors. It follows severe exhaustion under a continuing assault of stressors when the suicidal individual is no longer able to cope with and to restore homeostasis. In order to categorise a case as a suicide, legal authorities demand unequivocal evidence of intent.