Soviet Suicide Rate on Decline, Report Says
The Soviet Union’s suicide rate has fallen since 1985, partly as a result of the Kremlin’s anti-alcohol campaign, a Soviet medical journal said Sunday.
In 1987, 54,000 people killed themselves in the Soviet Union, Meditsinskaya Gazeta said, citing the States Statistics Committee as its source.
It did not give any overall statistics for any other year but did say that the rate had declined, especially among men, since 1985. For example, among men aged 50 to 59, the suicide rate fell from 98.5 per 100,000 people in 1985 to 56.1 in 1987, it said.
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