More Americans now commit suicide than die in car crashes, making suicide the leading cause of injury deaths, according to a new study.
Over the past 10 years, while the number of deaths from car crashes has declined, deaths from poisoning and falls increased significantly, the researchers report.
"Suicides are terribly undercounted; I think the problem is much worse than official data would lead us to believe," said study author Ian Rockett, a professor of epidemiology at West Virginia University. There may be 20 percent or more unrecognized suicides, he said.
Many of the poisoning deaths may actually be intended, he added. A lot of these deaths are from overdoses of prescription drugs, Rockett noted.
"We have a situation that has gotten out of hand," he said. "I would like to see the same attention paid to other injuries as has been paid to traffic injuries."
The report was published online in the American Journal of Public Health.
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