QUT’s Associate Professor Gordon Tait and Professor Belinda Carpenter’s recent publication in the international journal Mortality has highlighted the issue of suicide determination within the coronial system.
The paper identifies how current research suggests an overwhelming systemic underestimation of suicide rates of anywhere between 15-50%. The authors argue that suicide statistics do not measure the actual incidence of suicide; rather, they only measure what is counted and labelled as such. The paper provides a valuable examination of the issues relating to the coronial governance of suicide, to how suicide is defined within the coronial system and to how suicide can be practically categorised by coroners.
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