A season of darkness
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Suicide rates peak in the spring. The British army finds it difficult to replace bearskins. Here is the scientific basis for these phenomena.
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SPRING BLUES: New beginnings or a change for the worse for the depressed? Photo K. Ramesh Babu
Why do suicide rates peak in the spring?
Psychiatrists have been scratching their chins over this one for years. Counterintuitively, the arrival of spring and the long sunny days it ushers in, mark a staggering rise in suicide rates.
This week, mental health experts at the UK-based Priory group said that May was the peak month for suicides in Britain.
"The increase can be dramatic, with up to 50 per cent more successful suicides in some cases,'' says Chris Thompson, director of health care at the Priory group.
In Britain, about 6,300 people take their own lives each year, 90 per cent of whom are likely to have mental health problems.
The seasonal effect is seen all over the world, with the northern hemisphere witnessing a big rise in suicides in May and June and the southern hemisphere seeing a similar rise in November.
While no one has a complete explanation as to why, the leading theory is that the increase is down to the effects of sunlight on our hormones.
According to Mr. Thompson, the seasonal changes that bring most of us out of winter apathy may work against those who are coming out of severe depression. "It is a harsh irony that the partial remission which most depression sufferers experience in the spring often provides the boost of energy required for executing a suicide plan,'' he says.
"Spring is a time for new beginnings and new life, yet the juxtaposition between a literally blooming world and the barren inner life of the clinically depressed is often too much for them to bear.''
Paradoxically, says Mr. Thompson, sunlight-driven changes in levels of the feel-good chemical serotonin may make people more aggressive and, if they are depressed, they could direct that aggression at themselves.
The theory gains some support from research by Canadian scientists linking seasonal changes in bright sunlight with more violent suicides. Other researchers believe that the influence of sunlight on another hormone, melatonin, is to blame. Sunlight inhibits production of melatonin, which is known to influence our behaviour.
Ian Sample
Why has the British army found it so difficult to replace bearskins?
Because hair is a complex thing and tough to reproduce artificially. But complaints from the animal rights lobby have forced the army to reconsider its affinity with bearskins, made from culled black bears in Canada, for 2,500 members of the Grenadier, Welsh, Irish, Scots and Coldstream Guards regiments.
For the past decade, the army has been looking at alternatives, to no avail. Fibres made from nylon either don't hold their shape, cannot withstand the weather, or lose their colour. Or they stand poker straight in the wrong electrical conditions.
This week, the army was again set to trial a new alternative, although the Ministry of Defence was keeping quiet on the details of the material.
Hair is notoriously hard to copy. "There's a centre layer called the medulla and the area around that is the cortex,'' says Barry Stevens, general secretary of the Trichological Society.
"You've got a whole series of cells around that which keep the whole thing together... The outer layer is rather like fish scales.'' In contrast, artificial hair — usually made of nylon — is just a smooth cylinder. It can't absorb water and the fibres don't stick together.
ALOK JHA
© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
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