by wendydavis
Military Madness: Suicides Spike, ‘Rogue’ Sergeant Bales and Foreclosure Killings
11:47 am in Uncategorized by wendydavis
You’ve probably seen the recent headlines indicating that in the first 155 days of 2012, 154 active duty military personnel committed suicide. One soldier a day committed suicide, roughly 50% more than were killed in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And the statistics include only active-duty troops, not veterans who returned to civilian life after fighting in Iraq or Afghanistan. Nor does the Pentagon’s tally include non-mobilized National Guard or Reserve members. Good God all-Friday.
Military spokesmen expressed surprise at the spike; according to them, suicides had leveled off in 2010 and 2011, and are higher in number than the military had projected given past rates, according to the AP. Actuarial charts on military suicides is a concept I hadn’t even considered; the piece mentions the anti-suicide programs and phone hotline the military has set up to help…
While discussing the conventional causes of military suicide: combat stress, PTSD, multiple tours, over-use of ‘prescription’ drugs, two things popped out at me. One item in the list of assumed contributing factors was ‘financial stress’; the other was the apparent fact that a considerable number of suicides were among those who had never deployed. WTH? More about that perplexing fact later.
