Pretty much every discussion of covid had multiple people claiming that suicides went up so much, that they probably turned lockdowns, masking etc contraproductive. Cause they supposedly drove more people to suicide then saved.

The suicides went down thing really goes against what significant part if HN wants to believe.

> The suicides went down thing really goes against what significant part if HN wants to believe.

And I just provided half a dozen links to better research that shows that this "suicides went down thing" is misleading.

So yes, let's have a conversation about people cherry-picking the data they'd prefer to believe.

It's valuing the hard statistics in the article over people asking other people how they are feeling, not cherrypicking. Trying to convince people that suicidal ideation and attempts are up without a corresponding increase in suicides is going to be a hard sell.

It's only a "hard sell" to people who refuse to change their minds when presented with statistics that contradict their preferred narrative.

Can you explain how you would reconcile this with what the Economist is reporting then?

It's important to realise there's a lag with suicide statistics, and most of the research is looking at early days, and all of the researchers are saying that distress is up and we need to guard against a rise in future.

Here's Prof Louis Appleby, clinical lead for suicide prevention in England.

https://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2021/03/10/louis-appleby-what-has-...

> A year into the pandemic, what is the evidence? The short answer is that there has been little effect. But it’s more complex than that, as it always is with suicide statistics.

> First though, it’s important to stress that the graphs and figures that are used to answer this question are not dry data. They represent real lives lost, real families devastated. No suicide rate, whether high or low, rising or falling, is acceptable. Even before covid-19, there were over 6000 deaths by suicide per year in the UK, an estimated 800,000 worldwide.

[...]

> Our conclusions at this stage, however, should be cautious. These are early findings and may change. Beneath the overall numbers there may be variations between demographic groups or geographical areas. After all, the impact of covid-19 itself has not been uniform across communities.

Late to this, but this research included metrics going to October that showed the continued reduction in suicides.

Yes. The Economist is cherry picking data from one place, in one narrow period of time. All of the other studies (that you keep ignoring) cover much larger samples of people, over longer periods of time.

Also, "number of successful suicides" is an extreme, myopic metric for mental health. Ignoring all of the upstream signs of decreased mental well-being, and focusing only on successful suicides, is like measuring societal well-being exclusively by homicide rate.

"Sure, people are depressed, anxious, isolated and panicked, have increased suicidal ideation, and are seeking therapy in greater numbers than ever before...but they're not successfully killing themselves! All is well!"