Citation

Lehmann F, Alary PE, Rey G, Slama R. Am. J. Epidemiol. 2022; ePub(ePub): ePub.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2022, Oxford University Press)

DOI

10.1093/aje/kwac150

PMID

35993227

Abstract

Suicide is one of the leading causes of death in young adults in many Western countries. We examined the short-term association of temperature with cause-specific mortality, comparing suicide with other causes of death and describing possible attenuation of associations with temperature across decades. We considered all deaths that occurred in France between 1968 and 2016. For each cause of death, we conducted a two-stage meta-analysis of associations with daily temperature. We stratified the association across time-periods. 502,017 deaths by suicide were recorded over 49 years. Temperature was monotonously associated with suicide mortality. The strongest association was found at lag 0 day. The relative risk of suicide mortality at the 99th (compared to the first) temperature percentile was 1.54 (95% confidence interval: 1.46, 1.63). Among all causes of death, suicide was the only one displaying a monotonous trend with temperature and ranked seventh for heat-related mortality; two other causes of death implying the nervous system ranked third and fourth. Associations with temperature attenuated between the 1968-1984 and 1985-2000 periods for all-cause mortality and suicide mortality, without clear further attenuation in the 2001-2016 period. The robust short-term monotonous association between temperature and suicide risk could be considered in heat effects- and suicide-related prevention campaigns.

Language: en

Keywords

Suicide; Mortality; Temperature; Climate change; Adaptation; time series