Yes, Unnecessary Deaths
Am I referring to homicides? Am I referring to the slaughtering of young children in Newtown? No, I’m referring to military personnel who take their own lives…..suicides. Leon Panetta, Secretary of Defense calls it an epidemic. The pentagon reports 349 deaths by suicide among service men and woman during 2012. Yes, that’s almost one per day. Meanwhile 295 were killed in combat. In 2011 there were 301 suicides. Looking back to 2009 there were 310. This is not a new phenomenon but a growing one. In 2005 there were approximately half as many. What’s going on here?
I can’t forget, after many years as a therapist, the devastation experienced by the families of individuals who commit suicide. There are also the friends, fellow service men and woman who are impacted. The sense of loss and guilt is carried for the rest of their lives and it puts them at higher risk of suicide themselves. The impact of one suicide can be like a life-long tsunami of emotion for the survivors. Let’s not forget them.
According to a suicide researcher quoted by the CBS News these suicides take place among two primary groups. The first are the war veterans who are suffering from depression, PTSD and with substance abuse issues. Stress, guns and alcohol constitute a dangerous mixture. The second group is made up of those who haven’t gone to war but have troubled lives with unhappy marriages, divorces and other personal problems. Sixty percent of the reported suicides were by firearms, most of them personal firearms not military.
The rate of suicide among military personnel may not be any higher than for the general population but both rates are inexcusably high. Mental health services must be more readily accessible and less stigmatizing. And we could stop senseless wars. There is much more we could be doing to preserve valuable lives.
What do you think?
Stan the Man
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