Knowing the suicide risk of individual population groups means being able to support those groups with tailored prevention programmes. Together with researchers from Frankfurt and Bielefeld, a team of researchers headed by Dr Daniel Radeloff, Gerald Brennecke and Dr Franziska Stoeber from the Department of Paediatric Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics at Leipzig University Hospital analysed the suicide risk among the largest groups of European migrants in Germany. To this end, they compared suicide rates from 2000 to 2017 among Germans and migrants from Turkey, Italy, Poland, Greece, Ukraine, the Russian Federation, Romania, the Netherlands and Spain. The figures come from the research data centres of the statistical offices of the Länder.
During the period under review, around 200,000 people in Germany took their own lives. Some 9000 of these suicides were committed by migrants. Relative to the share of the population, suicide rates among Germans were around twice as high as among foreigners. “One explanation for the lower suicide risk among foreigners is the healthy migrant effect. Migration is associated with many challenges: migrants face language barriers and difficulties gaining access to the education system, to medical and therapeutic assistance. But this does not seem to translate to a higher suicide risk. It is assumed that people who are mentally and physically healthy are more likely to take on the task of going to a new country and making a fresh start there,” said Radeloff, explaining the difference. The risk of suicide differed greatly between the individual migrant groups. For example, Russian migrants were 3.7 times more likely to commit suicide than Greeks. Because the suicide rates among migrants correlated with suicide rates in their countries of origin, the researchers conclude that individual risk and protective factors in those countries of origin remain effective even after migration. Of the total population of migrants, the suicide rate was highest among adolescents and decreased steadily with age.
Socio-economic status and climate correlate with suicide rate
In addition to age and gender, the researchers also included climate data in their analysis. They found a strong correlation between suicide rates and the climate of the country of origin. Although moving to Germany meant a change in climatic conditions for most migrants, the link with the climate in their country of origin remained. “Climatic conditions may have an indirect influence on suicide risk by influencing genetic or environmental risk and resilience factors in the long term. The latter can remain effective after immigration, even if the person now lives in a different climate zone,” said Radeloff.
A further correlation was found with socio-economic factors. Integration into working life can be seen as a protective factor. For example, higher net household income or weekly working hours were associated with lower suicide rates. The researchers were also interested in the effects of the financial crisis in 2008 on the suicide rate among migrants. While suicide rates rose in the severely affected countries such as Greece, Italy or Spain, they decreased among migrants from these countries in Germany.
Original title in the Journal of Affective Disorders:
“Suicide among immigrants in Germany”. DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2020.05.038
Note:
Journalists are asked to observe the German Society for Suicide Prevention’s press code for publications on the subject of suicide.