Army Takes Steps To Lower Suicide Rate

With the suicide rate among soldiers at its highest point since the service started keeping statistics on it in 1980, Army mental health officials outlined steps they have taken to curtail such incidents. Soldiers and their families get briefings before and after deployments that explain potential problems and offer paths of solution, Col. Elspeth C. Richie, the Army surgeon general’s chief advisor on psychiatry, told reporters during a May 30 briefing at the Pentagon. One hundred and fifteen soldiers killed themselves in 2007, up from 102 in 2006. To date, 38 soldier deaths in 2008 have been confirmed as suicides. Judgment on another 12 deaths is still pending.