What Accounts for the Differences in Suicide Trends Across Countries of the Former Soviet Union?

Suicide is a major public health problem worldwide. The Slavic countries of the former Soviet Union Russia, Ukraine and Belarus retain one of the highest suicide rates in the world, despite a gradual decline over the past decade. Since the early 1980s, suicide mortality in these countrieshas undergone sharp fluctuations. In general, the temporal pattern of suicide mortality fluctuations was similar for three countries: sharp decrease in the mid of 1980s, dramatic increase in the first half of 1990s followed by a decline. 

While the trends in suicide mortality have been similar in three countries during the Soviet period, there was significant discrepancy after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. In particular, Russia experienced thesharpest suicide mortality fluctuations during anti-alcohol campaign andtransition. In Russia suicide rate jumped dramatically between 1991 and 1994. There was also a spike in suicide mortality between 1999 and 2001 in Russia, which might be explained by the financial crisis in 1998. In Ukraine and Belarus, suicide rates increased steadily up to 1996 and then started to decrease.