The number of Jamaicans taking their own lives has started to climb again, after a brief drop in 2002, official statistics have confirmed.

Up to December 29 last year, a total of 64 persons, comprising 55 males and nine females, chose suicide as a means of resolving a variety of issues including financial woes, romance turned sour or chemical imbalances in the brain.

Those 64 self-inflicted deaths are seven less than the 57 suicides committed in 2002, figures from the police commissioner’s statistical department show.

In 2002, mental health planners celebrated a break in the rise of suicides which numbered 73 in the previous year. The 2003 reversal is likely to trigger a new search for answers as to why more Jamaicans are killing themselves.

Professor Fred Hickling, head of the University of the West Indies’ department of psychiatry, suggests that suicide is largely no more than a mental health problem, mainly due to depression.

“Newspaper journalists fan the flame that economic and social conditions cause suicides, but most people have adaptive mechanisms to cope with stress,” he tells the Sunday Observer. “Depression happens mainly because of chemical disturbances in the brain.”

Dr Earl Wright, director of mental health services and substance abuse at the ministry of Health agrees with Hickling that depression is a chemical disorder and should be treated with medication and not only counselling.

As suicides increased so, too, did sales of anti-depressants in Jamaica last year, according to a major pharmaceutical distributor and some pharmacies checked by the Sunday Observer.

Karen Thomas, of Medi-Grace, says sales of anti-depressants were high, with the generic drugs doing better business than the well-known, Prozac.

“Seraquan is selling well, despite its higher price because it has less side effects,” explains Eleanor Watson, pharmacist at the heavily-trafficked York Pharmacy in Half-Way-Tree, St Andrew.

Rajani Aleti, at Moodie’s, reported increased sales of antidepressant drugs in 2003, noting that sales of Prozac and Paxil at her pharmacy had been especially significant since November.

Based on the statistical profile, the typical Jamaican suicide victim is male, lives in the rural areas, is most likely to be financially strapped or hurting romantically and chooses hanging as the way out.

In terms of parishes, Kingston and St Andrew currently have the highest suicide rate with 16 of the 28 suicides committed in urban areas. Manchester leads the rural areas with nine, followed by Westmoreland with eight.

Police figures show 46 of the 2003 suicide victims hanged themselves, eight ingested poison, six shot themselves, two chose drowning and one set himself ablaze.

Authorities put the most recent high profile hanging suicide – that of Wilfred ‘Bigga’ Rhoden who died in hospital reportedly from wounds inflicted in a suicide attempt – down to love gone wrong. Rhoden had chopped his wife and three children mid-December in Kencot, St Andrew and then attempted to hang himself, after allegedly being spurned by the woman.

“Males tend to channel their depression in more aggressive ways, they may play a sport, become violent, or simply carry out the act, but in most cases of female suicide-attempts, attention and intervention are the primary motives,” says Racquel McCarthy, counselling psychologist at the Family Life Ministry.

Both McCarthy and Wright say more women than men threaten suicide but the men are more successful.

But on the plus side, Wright says that Jamaica’s rate of three suicides per 10,000 persons is comparatively lower than other countries.

World Health Organisation (WHO) 2002 figures show that there were 815,00 suicides compared to 310,00 war-related deaths and 520,000 homicides.

Wright adds that 60 to 70 per cent of those who commit suicide have a history of depression but antidepressants could help 90 per cent of patients and completely cure 60 per cent of cases.

Wright also sees an increase in young adult suicides. Eight of the 64 suicides on police blotters were committed in the 21-25 age group and 10 by those in the 26-30 age group.

The elderly are more prone to take the suicide route. So far, eight in the 61-65 age group and five in the 41-45 age group have taken their own lives.

According to Wright, increased depression and mental illness, which he says lead to alcoholism and drug abuse in many cases, cost the society. As a combative measure he says that the ministry of health in September and October trained more doctors to recognise and treat mental illnesses and has for over a year been using its screening instrument for depression.