FOI Ref: FOI/2021/3098
You asked
Please supply the following information:
- Number of deaths in the UK recorded as suicide within the past 5 years (2015 to present).
- A break-down of the above into Male & Female. Over 18 & Under 18.
- Number of deaths in the UK classified as suicide or undetermined intent where 'Paramedic' or similar is stated as an occupation within the past 5 years (2015 to present).
- A break-down of the above into Male & Female.
Number of deaths in the UK classified as suicide or undetermined intent where 'Full-Time Student' or similar is stated as an occupation within the past 5 years (2015 to present).
- A break-down of the above into Male & Female.
Number of deaths in the UK classified as suicide or undetermined intent where 'Police Officer' or similar is stated as an occupation within the past 5 years (2015 to present).
- A break-down of the above into Male & Female.
Number of deaths in the UK classified as suicide or undetermined intent where 'Fire Fighter' or similar is stated as an occupation within the past 5 years (2015 to present).
- A break-down of the above into Male & Female.
We said
Thank you for your request.
We are responsible for the provision of mortality statistics for England and Wales. National Records Scotland (NRS) and the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) are responsible for statistics pertaining to Scotland and Northern Ireland. Therefore, we do not hold the requested data for the whole of the UK. Should you wish to obtain this data from NRS and NISRA, they can be contacted at foi@nrscotland.gov.uk and info@nisra.gov.uk respectively.
However, please see the following information we hold regarding your request for England and Wales.
Number of deaths recorded as suicide within the past 5 years (2015 to present)
We have recently published the annual dataset for Suicides in England and Wales. Please see 'table 1' annual suicide totals in England and Wales.
Our most up-to-date analysis for suicide data are our quarterly provisional figures, accessible via the following link: Deaths caused by suicide by quarter in England This provides suicides that have been registered quarterly in England up to 2020, but also includes provisional data for quarter 1 and quarter 2 of 2021.
A break-down of the above into Male & Female - Over 18 & Under 18.
We publish suicide data for England and Wales split by sex in 'table 1' of our annual Suicides in England and Wales dataset. You can also see suicides by 5yr age group and sex in 'table 5' of this dataset.
Provisional suicide data for England, split by sex and age is available in Deaths caused by suicide by quarter in England, please see 'table 2_age'.
Unfortunately, we do not hold analysis for the age groups as you have requested.
Number of deaths classified as suicide or undetermined intent where 'Paramedic' or similar is stated as an occupation within the past 5 years (2015 to present)
Occupations are defined using the Standard Occupation Classification (SOC 2010). Definitions of all groups and individual occupations can be found here: https://www.ons.gov.uk/methodology/classificationsandstandards/standardoccupationalclassificationsoc/soc2010/soc2010volume1structureanddescriptionsofunitgroups
We have produced ad hoc analysis on Suicide by occupation, England and Wales, 2011 to 2020 registrations, these datasets provide an insight into suicides by different occupational groups and also by sex.
There are multiple occupation groups codes attributed to professions:
- In table 2 you will find a breakdown of suicides for sub-major occupation groups by sex, health professionals.
- Table 3 contains suicides for minor occupation groups by sex, health professionals.
- If you are looking for a specific health professional occupation, I would suggest looking at table 4. This table contains individual annual figures for paramedics by sex.
Most suicide deaths are investigated by coroners in what's known as an inquest. The amount of time it takes to hold an inquest causes a lag between the date of death and the date of death registration, referred to as a registration delay. Registration delays for deaths caused by suicide tend to be 5 to 6 months on average. We do hold raw data on occupation for some suicides that occurred in 2021. However, due to these registration delays, we do not hold analysis on this yet as the data we hold is not complete enough to be able to publish occupation data for 2021.
Number of deaths classified as suicide or undetermined intent where 'Full-Time Student' or similar is stated as an occupation within the past 5 years (2015 to present) and a break-down of this by sex.
Please see the following publication: Suicides in full-time students aged 18 years and above, by sex, registered in England and Wales between 2010 and 2019.
We do not hold this analysis for data for 2020 and 2021. However, we may be able to extract this data for 2020 for you as a bespoke request. Special extracts and tabulations of mortality data for England and Wales are available to order (subject to legal frameworks, disclosure control, resources and agreements of costs, where appropriate). Such enquiries can be made to: Health.Data@ons.gov.uk.
We hold some raw suicide data on students for deaths that were registered in 2021. However, as mentioned above, due to the suicide registration delays, the data we hold is not complete enough to be able to create suicide meaningful analysis showing a breakdowns for students in 2021.
Number of deaths classified as suicide or undetermined intent where 'Police Officer' or similar is stated as an occupation within the past 5 years (2015 to present) by sex.
We have produced ad hoc analysis on Suicide by occupation, England and Wales, 2011 to 2020 registrations, this includes figures for Police Officers which are split into different occupational groups.
There are multiple occupation groups codes attributed to Police Officer roles, you can view these occupation figures split by sex in table 4.
As above, we do not hold analysis on the small amount of data we hold for 2021 suicides.
Number of deaths in the UK classified as suicide or undetermined intent where 'Fire Fighter' or similar is stated as an occupation within the past 5 years (2015 to present) by sex.
We have produced ad hoc analysis on Suicide by occupation, England and Wales, 2011 to 2020 registrations, this includes figures for Fire Service Officers which are split into different occupational groups.
You can view Fire Service Officer occupation suicide figures by sex in table 4.
If you would like to discuss your query further, please contact health.data@ons.gov.uk.