Leading causes of death and overall suicide rates
In contrast to the Veterans suicide monitoring section that examines data trends over time, this page presents analyses of the suicide data aggregated for the whole monitoring period from 1997 to 2023. These analyses include leading causes of death and overall suicide rates. The most recent year of death data (2023) has been added to the overall monitoring period. The main findings remain consistent with previous reporting.
When interpreting this data, it is important to recognise that broad service status groups of permanent, reserve, and ex-serving are not homogenous and factors beyond service status and sex also contribute to the observed data. The section How do suicide rates for ex-serving members compare by service-related characteristics? presents data among sub-groups of ex-serving members.