2020: High income status, higher suicide rates too

University Malaya Medical Centre says that in the last 20 years, seven to 12 for every 100,000 Malaysians have died from committing suicide.

KUALA LUMPUR: Suicide cases in Malaysia may increase, a psychiatrist has warned as lifestyles change in light of the nation reaching high-income status in 2020.

In a report by The Rakyat Post, University Malaya Medical Centre (UMMC) consultant psychiatrist Muhamad Muhsin Ahmad Zahari said that according to records held by the National Suicide Registry for 2012, suicide cases in the country accounted for 1.3 deaths for every 100,000 people.

He said that while the suicide rate in the country was not at a worrying level, it could increase as the nation inched closer to 2020 due to current lifestyles.

“We need to take precautions. In the last 20 years, seven to 12 people for every 100,000 Malaysians died from suicide,” he said. “For the same period in Singapore, the ratio was 15 to 20 for every 100,000.

The psychiatrist explained that those prone to committing suicide usually fell in the 12- and 20-year age group, where the pressure exerted on them to perform well in school or college, drove them to the edge.

He also said that since having suicidal thoughts was something that was built over a period of time and seldom an abrupt decision an individual made, family members and close friends could play a big role in helping curb suicidal tendencies.

He referred to statistics by the National Health and Morbidity Survey that showed 12 per cent of Malaysians, aged between 18 and 60, suffered mental health problems.

Statistics by the World Health Organisation (WHO) for 2012 meanwhile recorded 800,000 suicides worldwide every 40 seconds.

The Rakyat Post spoke to a 25-year-old psychiatric patient at Kuala Lumpur Hospital (HKL), who said he had been driven to suicide many times by family problems and life pressures.

“I am neither crazy nor insane, but because of family problems (his parents divorced) and life pressures, I tried to commit suicide many times,” he said.

“This is not the first time I tried to kill myself. When I was 20, my father married another woman and my mother moved to Shah Alam. I felt emotional stress because I was treated like a stranger at home.”

In conjunction with World Health Day yesterday, president of Pertubuhan Ikram Malaysia (Ikram) said his NGO would hold several programmes on psychiatry, psychology and counselling that related to family, teenagers, children, the law, public service and social work.

“Ikram always welcomes cooperation with those who are experts in the area of mental health.

“Ikram will continue efforts to work with professionals and community activists to create a healthy community physically, mentally and spiritually,” the news portal quoted him as saying.