In an 1,800-word article, USA Today (10/5, Zoroya) reports that the US “Army, which recorded an average of six suicides per week last year, now stands at the edge of a science-driven answer” to the problem of military suicides “as radical as it is uncomplicated: predicting which soldiers are likely to kill themselves so they can be stopped before it’s too late.” The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), along with researchers from several US universities have developed a “computer code…designed to” help predict which soldiers are likely to commit suicide. USA Today added, “NIMH epidemiologist Michael Schoenbaum, a lead scientist in the effort, says he and others on the team applied a complex set of risk factors – such as psychiatric illness, deployment history or drug or alcohol abuse – to a computer assessment of soldiers, producing a rating that’s a ‘flag for whom do you target for special care.’”
Related Links:
— “Army explores predicting suicides as way to prevent them, “Gregg Zoroya, USA Today, October 7, 2013.