Indigenous Australia would have the 12th-highest suicide rate globally if it was ranked alongside the world’s sovereign states.
With a suicide rate of 20.1 per 100,000, it would fall just behind India (21.1 per 100,000) and ahead of South Sudan (19.8 per 100,000) in the United Nations’ global rankings for worst suicide rate, according to a Fairfax Media analysis. The lowest rate, 0.4, was recorded jointly by Syria and Saudi Arabia.
About 560 Indigenous Australians of all ages died by suicide between 2008 and 2012, according to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare’s 2015 report on Indigenous health and welfare, released last month.
Indigenous people of all ages are nearly twice as likely to die by suicide than non-Indigenous people – a gap that has increased since 1998 because the non-Indigenous suicide rate has declined by 25 per cent while the Indigenous rate has remained stubbornly high.
Australia as a whole ranks 64th out of 171 countries, with a national rate of 10.6 suicides per 100,000.
Indigenous children under 14 are nearly eight times more likely to die by suicide than their non-Indigenous peers, according to Australian Bureau of Statistics figures released last month.
Suicide was the second-leading cause of death for Indigenous people in this age group, accounting for one in 10 deaths (11 per cent) between 2008 and 2012, Australian Institute of Health and Welfare figures show.
Suicide caused nearly one in three deaths (29 per cent) of Indigenous Australians aged between 15 and 34. It was the leading cause of death in this age group between 2008 and 2012.
The chart above shows Western Australia had the worst suicide rate in Australia between 2008 and 2012, with 35.2 suicides per 100,000, compared with 11.4 per 100,000 in NSW.
But a further breakdown of the figures by age as well as jurisdiction (see the chart below) shows the Northern Territory’s Indigenous 25 to 34-year-olds had the nation’s highest suicide rate during this period.
Among this age group, the suicide rate in the Northern Territory was 68.9 per 100,000 between 2008 and 2012, according to Productivity Commission figures.
Leilani Darwin, an Indigenous project worker with youth mental health agency headspace’s School Support program in the NT said high levels of exposure to suicide from a young age could “normalise suicide” in some communities.
“School staff and community leaders tell us that most of their students know of someone who has suicided,” she said.
“It has significant cultural consequences for them. Young people can relate to, and identify with, the actions of their peers, so they might see suicide as a viable option for them, too.”
Indigenous rates of admission to hospital for intentional self-harm have skyrocketed in the past eight years, rising 10 times faster than the non-Indigenous rate.
In 2012-13, Indigenous people were 2.7 times more likely to have been admitted to hospital for self harm than their non-Indigenous peers, up from 1.7 in 2004-05, Productivity Commission figures show.
Suicide and self harm are the tip of the iceberg when it comes to tackling mental health issues in Indigenous communities, said Mental Health Commissioner, psychologist and University of Western Australia researcher Pat Dudgeon.
“Suicide is that last, final act. You might have family members abusing substances, who are in prison. There’s long-term unemployment, poverty, terrible health,” she said.
“And there’s still ongoing racism … Aboriginal people are not afforded the same opportunities as other people and that takes its toll as well.”
A cursory glance at the statistics indicates the depth of the problem, Professor Dudgeon said.
Indigenous women were 31 times more likely to go to hospital as a consequence of assault in 2012-13, according to the AIHW report.
Overall, Indigenous people were 14 times more likely to be admitted to hospital for assault than their non-Indigenous peers.
Indigenous juveniles were 24 times more likely to be jailed and 14 times more likely to be under justice supervision than non-Indigenous juveniles during 2012-13. Indigenous adults were 16 times more likely to be jailed than non-Indigenous adults.
The Indigenous unemployment rate was four times higher than the national rate.
Aboriginal communities need to be part of the dialogue for change “and then adequately resourced to implement that change”, Professor Dudgeon said.
“A lot of problems come from a history of mainstream services not including Aboriginal people. We do need immediate responses – and some programs are already making a big impact – but we’ve also got to go for long-term change,” she said.
“Otherwise, it’s always just putting a little Band-Aid on a big problem.”
? Support is available for those who may be distressed by phoning Lifeline 13 11 14; Mensline 1300 789 978; Kids Helpline 1800 551 800.