Unemployment and Suicide. Evidence for a Causal Association?

In order to determine the independent associations of labour force status & socioeconomic position with death by suicide, the authors performed a cohort study assembled by anonymous & probabilistic record linkage of census & mortality records. They found that being unemployed was associated with a twofold to threefold increased relative risk of death by suicide, compared with being employed. They suggest that about half of this association might be attributable to confounding by mental illness. (32 refs)