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No protective factor need to be invoked.be explained
- Thomas J P Verberne (29 July 2003)
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Thomas J P Verberne, clinical neuropsychologist retired
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verberne{at}melbpc.org.au Thomas J P Verberne
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This is a revised version of the letter that was originally printed online - Correspondence Editor, 30th July 2003 McKenzie et al. (2003) concluded that Caribbean origin seemingly confers a degree of protection against suicide. They also noted that this protective effect had nearly disappeared in younger generations. The investigators did not consider the possibility that their findings might be explainable without having resort to a protective factor. On basis of the assumption that birth cohorts each have their quota of those predisposed to lethal self-harm (Lester, 1988; Murphy & Wetzel, 1980), and the apparent fact that death from lethal self-harm is not preventable, intergenerational differences in suicide rates are parsimoniously explainable as the outcome of intergenerational differences in health care experience. Improvements in health care experience will reduce death from preventable diseases. This will drive up the death rates of diseases that are not yet preventable, such as a predisposition to lethal self-harm. Younger UK-resident people of Caribbean origin are likely to have experienced better health care than their elders, if their proportion of UK-born is higher than that of their elders. If so, their suicide rate would be expected to be higher. To the extent that intergenerational differences in health care experience tend to favour younger generations generally, it is nevertheless expected that these differences have been larger in the case of UK-resident people of Caribbean origin, relative to British Whites. Lester, D. (1988) Birth cohort suicide rates in Canada. Suicide and Life-Threatening behavior, 18, 372-378. McKenzie K., Van Os J., Samele C., et al. (2003) Suicide and attempted suicide among people of Caribbean origin with psychosis living in the UK The British Journal of Psychiatry, 183, 40-44. Murphy G.E., Wetzel R.D. (1980) Suicide risk by birth cohort in the U.S., 1949-1974. Archives of General Psychiatry,37, 519-523. ____________________________________________________________ Thomas J. P. Verberne Rosanna, Victoria, Australia 'phone: 61 3 9459 7303 |
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