COVID-19 and risk factors of suicidal behaviour in UK: A content analysis of online newspaper

Background: Suicide is a serious global burden of disease. Recent COVID-19 pandemic has been associated with increased psychological distress among general population in UK and suicide is one of them. This research aimed to look into the suicide metrics in UK by analyzing the online news portals, retrospectively. Methods: Six UK online news portals were selected purposively to include in the study and news of suicides were searched retrospectively. Search was conducted by the term “suicide news”. News portals were initially searched with the search term retrospectively. After removal of the repetitions data is inputted into software. Results: Since 2020 January to November 2020, eighty-nine reports were scrutinized. Mean age was 37.91 (± 19.940) years ranging from 10-95 years. About 57.3% of the reported cases were less than 40 years of age, 58.4% were male, 41.6% were female, 40.4% of the respondents had mental health issues, covid-19 lockdown and restrictions accounts for 26.96% of suicides, 14.6% had health issues and 3.4% ongoing family issues. Previous suicide attempts were reported in 12.4% reports. Multiple number of persons involved in the suicidal acts in about 13.4% of the respondents. Highest suicide rate was reported in November 2020 with 21.34% of suicides. Conclusions: Early adult and male gender are more vulnerable. Mental health issues, covid-19 lockdown and restrictions, and health issues drew attention as risk factors. Suicide rate was higher in November 2020.