NewsWire: 12/17/2020
- Over the past year, suicide rates among young women have spiked in South Korea and Japan. Both nations have long struggled with a high suicide rates, and experts fear that the added stress and loneliness of the pandemic is only making matters worse. (The Washington Post)
- NH: Suicide rates among young women have soared in South Korea and Japan in recent months. In the first half of 2020, the number of suicides among South Korean women in their 20s increased by 43%. Similarly, between July and October, the total number of suicides in Japan rose by 41%, with the sharpest increases among women under age 29.
- South Korea and Japan are among only a handful of countries who report current data on suicides. Most nations take a year or more to report their numbers. Some experts regard these figures as our first look at the pandemic’s effect on mental health, and they worry they presage a broader increase in suicides worldwide.
- Like the rest of the world, South Korea and Japan have experienced economic strain and social isolation. Stress and anxiety are taking their toll on people, with much of the impact from job losses and increased unpaid care needs disproportionately falling on women.
- But South Korea and Japan have have long struggled with some of the highest suicide rates in the world. In 2017, South Korea had a suicide rate of 23.0 per 100,000 people, the highest suicide rate of the OECD countries. Japan wasn’t far behind with at 14.9. The global annual average is 10.6 per 100,000 people. It’s the only G7 country where suicide is the leading cause of death among young people (15- to 39-year-olds).
- Over the last decade, both countries saw success in lowering their suicide rates. But the pandemic has reversed that trend, and the reversal is largely being driven by young women. Male suicides have remained constant or increased only slightly.
- In both South Korea and Japan, women are caught in an intense clash between traditional Confucian values and modern expectations. They grew up in rapidly modernizing societies on equal footing alongside their male peers in school--only to enter a “real world” that remains highly patriarchal, sexist, and hierarchical. South Korea and Japan, respectively, have the two biggest gender wage gaps among OECD countries. Many feel that marriage and career are equally unpalatable life options. (See "South Korea's Fertility Rate Falls Below One.")
- Strong stigmas against mental illness also discourage people from seeking help when times are tough. Both countries have recently seen a spate of celebrity suicides among actors and singers in their 20s and 30s, which sparked discussions about the pressure young people feel to be perfect and to keep their struggles hidden.
