Individual and Familial Mental Illness is Associated With an Increased Risk of Suicide in Young People

The author comments on an article by E Agerbo et al which found that mental illness in young people & their family members may be linked with an increased risk of suicide. He draws attention to one problem with their statistical analyses which attributes the removal of a risk factor to a reduction in suicide, arguing that this is misleading because it is based on the flawed assumptions that 1) risk factors are causal & 2) causal factors are independent. (7 refs)