I am not saying it was, just that doubling of the rate means little by itself.

If the suicide rate is 17 per 22000, then natural variance alone will push about 14% of random 22k samples into "more than double the base rate" area.

In other words, if you take this indicator alone, then you'll have a false positive about 14% of the time. Obviously, the key word is "alone". With more data about bullying as the cause of suicide you might get better estimations.

> natural variance alone will push about 14% of random 22k samples into "more than double the base rate" area.

Is this true? Can you show the math on this? I'm not seeing it.

Nevermind, I made a mistake in my original calculations - used variance instead of standard deviation.

Actually (from approximating the binomial distribution with n=22k and p=17/22000 with normal one) getting the rate over 30 per 22k has p<0.001.

"Rémy set himself on fire in 2011 in front of a France Télécom office near Bordeaux"

GP doesn't seem to have read the article and is throwing some statistics gimmicks.