Armenia has lowest child suicide rate in Europe

PanARMENIAN.Net - Armenia has the lowest child suicide rate among the countries of the European region, the World Health Organization (WHO) said in a fresh report.

According to the WHO, 190 million children and adolescents under the age of 18 live in the European region. 44 million of them were physically and 18 million sexually abused, and 55 million experienced psychological trauma. 90 percent of all such cases go unnoticed, the WHO said.

Child abuse is often the cause of suicide, the report says. Russia leads by the number of child and adolescent suicides in the European region and is followed by Latvia, Belgium, Finland, Moldova, Ukraine and Kazakhstan. Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia, on the other hand, have the lowest child suicide rates.

WHO recommends changing the legislation, involving health workers in identifying such cases, acquainting parents with “peaceful” methods of education and teaching children how to defend themselves.