Paper

Suicide among Russians in Estonia: database study before and after independence

BMJ 2005; 330 doi: 10.1136/bmj.38328.454294.55 (Published 20 January 2005)
Cite this as: BMJ 2005;330:176
  1. Airi Värnik, director, professor of psychiatry1 (Airi.Varnik@ipm.ki.se),
  2. Kairi Kõlves, researcher1,
  3. Danuta Wasserman, professor of psychiatry and suicidology2
  1. 1 Estonian-Swedish Institute of Suicidology, Hariduse 6, Tallinn 10119, Estonia,
  2. 2 Swedish National and Stockholm County Centre for Suicide Research and Prevention of Mental Ill-Health (NASP), Karolinska Institute, Stockholm
  1. Correspondence to: A Värnik
  • Accepted 14 September 2004

Introduction

Migration has been reported as an important risk factor for suicide. Immigrants have a higher risk than exists in their countries of origin and than among the native population of their new country.1 2 According to the 1934 population census, before the second world war native Estonians constituted 88.1% of the total population of Estonia. By 1989, however, because of geopolitical changes related to the incorporation of Estonia into the Soviet Union, the Russian minority had grown to about 30%. We examined how the radically changed sociopolitical status of the Russian minority after the dissolution of the Soviet Union was reflected in their suicide rates.

Methods and results

We compared suicide rates of Russians in Estonia, Estonians in Estonia, and inhabitants of Russia from before (1983-90) and after the dissolution of the Soviet Union during Estonian independence (1991-8). We collected data from the World Health Organization reports on age adjusted suicide rates for …

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