Rise of veteran suicides continues...so do stunts

What the order of unhappy Facebook posts say about suicide risk

Desert News
Lois M. Collins
October 24, 2018

Male veterans ages 55-74 had the highest number of suicides, while male veterans 18-34, a much smaller cohort, had the highest suicide rate.

SALT LAKE CITY — The sequencing of social media posts may provide hints that a veteran is in acute distress and at risk for suicide, offering potential to intervene, according to a new study from the National Center for Veterans Studies at the University of Utah.

The findings might hold true for others in distress, too.

"How to Use Social Media Patterns to Identify Veterans at Risk for Suicide" was released as part of the Bob Woodruff Foundation's Stand Smart for Heroes series. The study found veterans who took their own lives were more likely to have recently posted about stressful events, followed closely by posts about emotional distress. The reverse — emotional distress and then stressful events — did not have the same association with suicide, said lead researcher and the center's executive director Craig Bryan, a board-certified clinical psychologist.

He said fewer than 5 percent of veterans who took their lives posted anything obviously suicidal on social media, so finding other clues is crucial.

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs calls suicide by veterans its "top priority." The department's new data finds suicide by young veterans increased 10 percent from 2015 to 2016, even as the rate among older veterans declined slightly. But between 2005 and 2015, veteran suicides had increased 25.9 percent, while non-veteran adult suicides increased more than 20 percent in that time period. Veterans overall are 1.5 times more likely than the general population to kill themselves.
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I hope you spotted things that you probably never heard of before. If you have been reading this site often, you'd know that already. 

Our veterans over the age of 50 are not on social media yet they need the most help but are getting the least attention!

The suicides have increased, just as the population of veterans has decreased. Much like you can see within this chart from the latest VA report.

Now, if someone could please explain to all the families left behind, why the hell they still support all the stunts for "raising awareness" when the number of veterans killing themselves continues to rise.