Student suicides at highest level in three years

SUICIDE rates for students are rising leaving universities with an “urgent challenge” to tackle the problem.

There were 95 student suicides in 2016 to 2017 – the highest number in three years, the Office for National Statistics found.

The rate among higher education students in England and Wales was 4.7 per 100,000 people, with men having a significantly higher rate than women. Among men the rate was 6.9, compared with three for women.

The rate moved above 4.5 per 100,000 people only once before 2013 but has been higher than this level ever since. Overall the ONS identified 1,330 students who died by suicide between the year ending July 2001 and the year ending July 2017.

The figures are lower than the rates for the general population, which the most recent figures for 2016-17 show were 16 per 100,000 people for men, and five for women.

John de Pury, assistant director of policy at Universities UK, said the issue was an “urgent challenge”.

The organisation was working with James Murray, father of Ben Murray, a University of Bristol student who took his own life earlier this year.

Mr de Pury said they aimed to develop policies that would result in “better join-up of university services for students in distress”.