TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan’s suicide rates have soared in the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, especially among women and children, even though they fell in the first wave when the government offered generous benefits to people, a research.
The July-October suicide rate rose 16% from the same period a year earlier, a stark reversal of the February-June decline of 14%, according to a study by researchers at Hong Kong University and Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Gerontology .
“Unlike normal economic conditions, this pandemic is disproportionately affecting the mental health of children, adolescents and women (especially housewives),” the authors wrote in the study published Friday in the journal Nature Human Behavior.
The early drop in suicides was influenced by factors such as government subsidies, reduced working hours and school closures, the study found.
But the decline reversed – with a suicide rate of 37% for women, about five times more than for men – as the protracted pandemic wreaked havoc on industries dominated by women, increasing the burden on working mothers, while increasing domestic violence, the report said.
The study, based on data from the Department of Health from November 2016 to October 2020, found that the suicide rate of children in the second wave increased by 49%, which is consistent with the period following a nationwide school shutdown.
Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga this month issued a COVID-19 state of emergency for Tokyo and three surrounding prefectures in an effort to stop the resurgence. He expanded it this week to seven more prefectures, including Osaka and Kyoto.
Taro Kono, minister of administrative and regulatory reform, told Reuters on Thursday that while the government would consider extending the state of emergency, it “cannot kill the economy.”
“People are concerned about COVID-19. But many people have also committed suicide because they lost their jobs, lost their income and couldn’t see hope, ”he said. “We have to find the balance between managing COVID-19 and managing the economy.”
Reporting by Eimi Yamamitsu; Editing by William Mallard