Army explores predicting suicides as a way to prevent them

Now maybe you'll believe what Wounded Times has been reporting on since 2007

“The reality is we’ve not had any meaningful impact over the course of the last decade [on military suicides],” said David Rudd, a suicide researcher and consultant to the Army on the new program. “We have to get outside the box.”

The money spent has been in the billions pushing the program that caused the most damage but they just kept doing it. This is the outcome of what they have done.

Army explores predicting suicides as a way to prevent them
USA Today
Gregg Zoroya
Oct. 5, 2013

Even as thousands of U.S. troops were dying in Iraq and Afghanistan during the 12 years of war following 9/11, about 3,000 perished by their own hand, nearly the same as the number of people lost on the day of those terrorist attacks.

Indeed, suicide is a perennial stain on the military that’s growing worse each year, a trajectory baffling to military leaders and devastating to the thousands of shattered families left behind.

“It just drives me crazy that we can’t figure [it] out,” said Army Deputy Undersecretary Thomas Hawley.

The Army, which recorded an average of six suicides per week last year, now stands at the edge of a science-driven answer as radical as it is uncomplicated — predicting which soldiers are likely to kill themselves so they can be stopped before it’s too late. This form of health assessment is unlike anything in the civilian world and one that the Army is meeting with a combination of enthusiasm and caution.

It’s also an idea that leaves Deborah Johnson wishing she could turn back time for the sake of her son, Jeremy.

The 23-year-old Army private died from an overdose of pain pills mixed with alcohol in March 2010, shortly after an instant-message exchange with his mother.
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