The purpose of the article is to determine the incidence of deaths due to self-immolation in Durban over a 5-year span. The method used was by obtaining data from the Department of Forensic Medicine of the University of Natal & the Medical Research CouncilÁøs National Injury Mortality Surveillance System. The results show 9.9% of suicides are self-immolation, which, in comparison with the 0.91% in international studies, is extremely high. The high proportion of suicides due to self-immolation is of concern & warrants further investigation. (CH)