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‘The suicide rate among divorced adults is more than three times that of married adults, while the suicide rate among singles is 1.5 to 2 times the rate among those who are married. In other words, marriage is a protective factor for suicide risk.’ https://ifstudies.org/blog/the-role-of-marriage-in-the-suicide-crisis
‘Opioids are now the leading cause of death for people under 50: a majority of them are unmarried or divorced men. Though only 32 percent of the population, that group of adults accounts for a stunning 71 percent of opioid deaths.’ https://www.city-journal.org/decline-of-family-loneliness-epidemic
These kinds of stats make me wonder about Scotland. 36% of Scots live alone, whereas in regards to the UK as a whole only 15% of house-holds are single-person house-holds. If you notice, Scotland’s number of drug deaths is alarming, might the two things be linked in some way?
Interestingly, after Scotland, Sweden has the highest number of drugs in Europe. Sweden is another country in which a large proportion of its citzenry live alone, 52% of Swedish house-holds contain just one person. The highest number in Europe https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/-/DDN-20170905-1?inheritRedirect=true
There are obviously lots of factors at play in regards to this picture but I would posit that it is probable that it forms part of the problem yet it is rarely mentioned when drug deaths are discussed.
The decline in marriage, the rise in divorce, the loosening of family ties, family breakdown. These are all things that are generally seen as right-wing/reactionary/conservative concerns & most ppl who study/write about these things lean left-wing/progressive. Huge blind-spot.
The answer to drug problems from a lot of these people is always liberalise, liberalise, liberalise, but what if liberalising things (in general) is a big part of what got us into this mess in the first place?
Once upon a time religion used to be the so-called ‘Opiate of the masses,’ now actual Opiates (& street Benzo’s) are the Opiates of the masses.
Incredible stat. https://twitter.com/VictimOfMaths/status/1339624658279272450?s=20
Remember that population-wise Scotland isn't even that big, Yorkshire has a larger population than Scotland does.
& its interesting that Blackpool is the one English authority in the top 24 for UK drug deaths bc there are a lot of Scottish people who live in Blackpool too.
Blackpool has long been popular with the Scots https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-28227510
So part of the reason why Blackpool has such a high rate of drug deaths might partly be related to that fact.
Suicide is not always necessarily related to mental illness https://twitter.com/DananTwit/status/1339716994824871937?s=20
For instance, a publicly exposed paedophile is at high risk for suicide, it doesnt necessarily mean that they are mentally ill. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3629679/
Most ppl who kill themselves never come into contact with mental health services. We cannot assume that they are all mentally ill.
Divorce is a big life change & that adjustment & that stress can result in ppl who don't have any previous history of mental illness attempting to kill themselves, just as any big life change can. https://twitter.com/robkhenderson/status/1288246460950163456?s=20
