According to a study produced by the Department of Veterans Affairs, U.S. military veterans accounted for an average of 22 suicides per day during 2010. This also fits within a larger narrative, as deaths by suicide have been rising as well within the country.

From the Washington Post:

The VA study indicates that more than two-thirds of the veterans who commit suicide are 50 or older, suggesting that the increase in veterans’ suicides is not primarily driven by those returning from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“There is a perception that we have a veterans’ suicide epidemic on our hands. I don’t think that is true,” said Robert Bossarte, an epidemiologist with the VA who did the study. “The rate is going up in the country, and veterans are a part of it.” The number of suicides overall in the United States increased by nearly 11 percent between 2007 and 2010, the study says.

As a result, the percentage of veterans who die by suicide has decreased slightly since 1999, even though the total number of veterans who kill themselves has gone up, the study says.

The sad fact is this trend coincides with violence against, and caused by, veterans with instances such as the killing of veteran Navy SEAL sniper Chris Kyle by a former Marine; and the very-recently resolved hostage situation that resulted in the death of Naval veteran Jimmy Lee Dykes, who was killed by FBI agents for killing a school bus driver and kidnapping a 5-year-old in Alabama.

This article appears in Jan 31 – Feb 6, 2013.

4 replies on “22 Vets Kill Themselves Each Day According to VA”

  1. “The rate is going up in the country, and veterans are a part of it.”

    But it’s not but it is. Seems to me no matter how you slice it there’s a problem and it’s pass the buck time.

  2. First of all, what were the parameters of looking at the veterans in this survey? How many were Active Duty, including Reservists and Guard members serving on Active Duty, how many Reservists and/or National Guard members not serving on AD? How many of these service members had been deployed: in CONUS, OCONUS to Germany, Korea, Japan, the Pacific Theater, or to the mideast theater such as Kuwait, but did not go down range; and how many were deployed downrange to combat action? In each of those demographics, what was the average age of those deployed AND what was the type of unit and average age of each of those units deployed? For instance, I was USAR and deployed at age 56 with a medical unit, many of whom were older nurses and docs. Often support troops are older, such as troops in medical units.
    Secondly, before we jump on the “all veterans are crazy” bandwagon, let’s look at some of the facts, even though many are yet to be revealed:
    a) Marine Reservist Routh, who is accused of killing CPO Kyle and his friend and workout buddy allegedly has PTSD, yet we don’t know at this point what is included in his active duty and/or deployed military history, much less his medical diagnoses so far. A big concern to me is that he was twice admitted to a psychiatric facility, which was a civilian facility and not a VA or similar military-familiar facility with experience with combat related PTSD.
    b) Navy Veteran, Jimmy Lee Dykes, the man who held a child hostage in a bunker for a week, allegedly (so far) was a Navy Veteran of Vietnam who served OCONUS in Japan in a clerical capacity for aircraft maintenance. There’s no history so far if he was ever deployed in country in Vietnam or if he had additional duties that would lend themselves, specifically, to PTSD, such as: assignment to mortuary affairs; loading or unloading aircraft with bodies or caskets to be sent back to CONUS; loading severely wounded onto aircraft to be sent back to CONUS. There’s a lot there yet to be revealed.
    To assume that if you’ve been on Active Duty during OEF/OIF means that you’re likely to be automatically labeled as someone outside law abiding norms does a huge disservice to all OEF/OIF veterans. Let’s wait and let the facts come in before leaping to conclusions.

  3. I would not be surprised to hear that a high percentage of those suicides are simply due to the fact that they have to deal with the bureaucracy nightmare that is the VA.

  4. Tiredofpc, who said all vets are crazy? There are two recent, high-profile events that resulted in the deaths of veterans. It’s bad timing more than it is anything else, coinciding with this report.

    But let’s also keep in mind that suicide killed more soldiers last year than combat deaths did. It’s not rosy times out there, friend.

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