Suicide in Iran: The Facts and the Figures from Nationwide Reports

Objective: Data on national rates of suicide is limited in Iran, preventing an action plan for health scope of suicide prevention. The current brief study was conducted to review available national published data on suicide and to interpret the probable discrepancies. Method: We evaluated all 20-year recent published original articles on committed suicides searching Iranian scientific databases, PubMed, and Google Scholar with the keywords of suicide, mortality, and Iran. Results: Articles showed an overall increased trend of suicidal deaths in Iran. Discrepancies existed regarding suicide rate and demographic characteristics among 9 English and Persian published articles. Although a suicide rate of 6.2 per 100 000 was reported in 2003, almost 31 times greater than 1991, an average suicide rate of 9.9 per 100 000 was calculated based on data interpretations. Conclusion: Apparently, Iran has had the highest increase in suicide-related deaths among Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) and Islamic countries during the recent decades. National policies to prevent suicide have not been efficient enough, and urgent intervention is needed.