The tragedy of becoming tired of living: Youth and young adults’ suicide in Greenland and Denmark

Larissa Bolliger and Gabriel Gulis

International Journal of Social Psychiatry, 2018, vol. 64, issue 4, 389-395

Abstract: Background: Suicide is a tremendous public health issue and worldwide the second leading cause of death among young people. In 2015, Greenland had the highest burden of disease due to self-harm with loss of 2,952.97 disability-adjusted life years per 100,000 inhabitants, more than six times as many as Denmark. Aims: What are possible reasons for Greenland’s higher youth suicide rate compared to Denmark, despite being one kingdom of Denmark? Method: Mixed methods in the form of qualitative, semi-structured interviews, the analysis of available data for 2003–2016 and a literature review were conducted with the aim to answer this question. Results: Several exposures cause this difference, most significantly adverse effects of the colonial past, such as social issues and experienced traumas in Greenland compared to its former coloniser Denmark. Conclusion: The ongoing burden of youth suicide in Greenland requires enhanced actions of all stakeholders involved in suicide prevention, intervention and postvention.

Keywords: Youth suicide; adolescent suicide; suicidal behaviour; Denmark; Greenland (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0020764018766198 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:socpsy:v:64:y:2018:i:4:p:389-395

DOI: 10.1177/0020764018766198

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in International Journal of Social Psychiatry
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().