Sunday Express misinterprets suicide data

Shock at huge rise in teenage suicide rate

An article in the Sunday Express print edition, and online, claims that 215 people aged 15-19 died by suicide in 2021. It also includes claims from the charity YoungMinds that “the total was 35 per cent up on 2020”.

Both of these claims are based on a misinterpretation of official data, which reports the number of deaths by suicide that were registered in 2021 in England and Wales—some of which may not have actually occurred in 2021.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS), which produced the data, warns specifically on the dataset that some suicide registrations may have been delayed from 2020 to 2021 by disruption due to the pandemic.

We do not yet know whether the number of teenage suicides rose in 2021 but the latest available evidence suggests that the suicide rate in 2021 for all ages was similar to the pre-pandemic rate.

Full Fact contacted YoungMinds, where a spokesperson told us: “We are grateful to Full Fact for pointing out that an apparent increase in suicides among young people in the last year could partly be explained by a delay in registration of deaths.

"We apologise for any confusion we caused by not making that clear. As an organisation that prides itself on accurate and thorough reporting of research, we are reviewing what happened to make sure we tighten our processes accordingly.”

What the Sunday Express said

Citing statistics from the ONS, which cover England and Wales, the Sunday Express article said there was “a record increase in the number of 15 to 19 year olds taking their lives” in 2021, and claims that “215 children in that age group killed themselves last year”.

In fact, these numbers refer to the number of suicide registrations in 2021.

In England and Wales, all deaths by suicide are certified by a coroner and cannot be registered until an inquest is completed, in a process which has recently taken around five to six months.

As a result, the data published by the ONS on suicides registered in a given year, do not show the number that actually occurred in that year.

So for example, only around half of the suicides registered in 2021 actually happened in 2021.

And there is reason to believe that fewer suicides than normal were registered during the pandemic disruption of 2020, leading to a backlog that may have made the numbers look like they were rising, or rising faster, the following year.

Speaking about suicide deaths in all ages in a statistician’s comment to accompany the data, the ONS Head of Analysis in Health and Life Events, James Tucker, said: “We saw a significant increase in the rate of deaths registered as suicide in 2021. This increase was the result of a lower number of suicides registered in 2020, because of the disruption to coroners’ inquests caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

“The 2021 suicide rate was similar to the pre-coronavirus pandemic rates in 2018 and 2019.

“The latest available evidence shows that suicide rates did not increase because of the coronavirus pandemic, which is contrary to some speculation at the time.”

A guidance note on the dataset itself says: "It is possible some suicides that ordinarily would have been registered in 2020, have been registered in 2021 due to the disruption caused by the pandemic."

Another note says: "Inaccurate use and reporting of data on suicide can have damaging consequences such as causing unnecessary or inappropriate concerns."

The article’s mistake was also noticed by users on Twitter.

Is the number of teenage suicides rising?

The Sunday Express article also suggested that the supposed rise might be related to lockdowns, with the headline in the online version saying: “Teenage suicide rate rose dramatically during lockdown restrictions”. 

There is some evidence that the pandemic has substantially affected the mental health of children, including during the lockdown periods, and other evidence of a general rise in the rate of mental health disorders in children and young adults.

However, we don’t yet know whether the number of suicides rose in 2021, because the available data on suicide occurrences (as opposed to registrations) only runs to the end of 2020.

It also doesn’t look at 15 to 19-year-olds specifically, but instead combines 10 to 24-year-olds into a single age group.

This data shows that the number and the rate of suicides in young people in 2020, which was the first year of the pandemic and its associated lockdowns, was lower than in 2019.

We have approached the Sunday Express for comment.

Contacting Samaritans

The Samaritans’ helpline is available at all hours and can be contacted free on 116 123, or you can email jo@samaritans.org

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