31 - Other suicide/undetermined accidents
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 April 2023
Summary
This is a residual sub-category of deaths due to external causes and includes methods of suicide or accidents that are not included elsewhere. This includes: intentionally crashing a vehicle, jumping or lying before a moving object, and other events where the intent is not determined, but suicide is often a possibility.
There is a female cluster of high SMRs in Inner London; for males there is an additional cluster in Manchester. The age–sex bar chart shows the predominance of male deaths and a distinct pattern by age group.
It is often difficult for a coroner to determine whether a death was suicide or an accident, which is why we have considered the two as one category.
The method of suicide that an individual chooses will be constrained by availability. Unless one has access to a firearm one cannot commit suicide by that method; a mobility-impaired person is perhaps unlikely to choose to jump to their death.
For the deaths of young children included here, infanticide, manslaughter or murder are likely to be possible explanations, rather than suicide. In general, a very small proportion of undetermined accidents will have been the result of murder, manslaughter, or other foul play.
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- The Grim Reaper's Road MapAn Atlas of Mortality in Britain, pp. 64 - 65Publisher: Bristol University PressPrint publication year: 2008