CHINA: Suicide is the main cause of death among young adults in China, the state media said yesterday, in a report that highlights the growing pressures to succeed in love, work and education in one of the world's fastest changing societies.
Increasing stress, loneliness and a lack of medical support for depression are thought to have contributed to an annual suicide toll estimated at 250,000 a year.
According to the China Daily, an additional 2.5 million to 3.5 million make unsuccessful attempts to kill themselves each year.
Referring to a recent survey by the health ministry, the paper said that suicide was the fifth most common cause of death in China.
But it is most prevalent among young urban intellectuals and rural women. Exam stress, career worries and relationship problems are named as the main reasons why suicide has become the main killer of people aged between 20 and 35.
Newspapers are filled with stories of bright and wealthy college students - almost all of them single children because of the state's one-child policy - who kill themselves because they fear they cannot fulfil their families' aspirations.
Among recent suicides was the death of a student at Guangzhou University in southern China who jumped off a campus building last week.
"I'm very sorry I can not live up to your expectations," wrote the student, named Jun, in a farewell note. It was an all too common story on campuses throughout China.
In the first six months of the year, 14 students killed themselves in Beijing, compared with 19 in the whole of 2004. According to the Beijing Suicide Research and Prevention Centre, China has 22 suicides for every 100,000 people, about 50 per cent higher than the global average.
Some of those who suffer get little public sympathy, notably the 1,000-plus communist cadres who kill themselves every year after being exposed in anti-corruption campaigns.
Others are ignored, particularly rural women whose suicide rate - about 30 in every 100,000 people - is among the highest in the world. Women in the countryside have less support in dealing with the traditional pressures of motherhood, farming and moving in with their in-laws.
Many also have access to pesticides - a very painful but effective way to commit suicide.