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10 | MHCE - News www.mhce.us NOVEMBER 2023 EDITION Military suicides overall dropped in 2022 as active-duty rate goes up and Pentagon works on prevention WASHINGTON — The suicide rate among active-duty troops slightly increased in 2022 as the overall number of suicides decreased in the military, according to an annual Pentagon report released Thursday. The Pentagon reported an active-duty suicide rate of about 25 suicide deaths for every 100,000 service members last year, a 3% increase from 2021. “The rate difference is not statistically significant, so we have low confidence this is a true change. It could be natural variability or chance,” said Liz Clark, the Pentagon’s director of the Defense Suicide Prevention Office. Clark said this also holds true for the rate of decreases among the Reserve and National Guard troops of 12% and 18%, respectively. Elizabeth Foster, the executive director of the Pentagon’s Force Resiliency Office, said due to the decreasing size of the active-duty force, the Defense Department believes the rate of suicides, rather than the number of suicides, is a more accurate measure. The department’s fifth annual “Suicide in the Military” report showed 492 service members
WWW.MHCE.US Monthly Newsletter | 11 died by suicide in 2022, down from 524 in 2021. For active-duty troops, there were 331 suicides in 2022, compared with 328 in 2021. Of those, Army suicides dropped from 175 in 2021 to 135 in 2022. The Marine Corps saw the biggest increase, from 43 to 61. The Air Force followed, which increased from 51 to 64, and the Navy dropped from 59 to 71. Space Force did not have any suicides. As in previous years, the 2022 report identifies young, enlisted men as the most vulnerable to suicide. About 91% of active-duty suicides
