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AlbaNY_Ram
I can't find any suicide data related to the current pandemic and I don't know how to relate this to our current situation ... but I did find this tidbit in relation to the recession we recently went thru:
"At least 10,000 more Americans and Europeans took their own lives from 2007 to 2010 than during the good economic times of the previous few years, the study found." [
www.usatoday.com]
10,000 extra suicides across 36 months works out to fewer than 300 a month combined in Europe and the USA.
Hmmm...I would have suspected more, but still far too many.
But since your research involved the Great Recession...
It was estimated that over 170K small businesses went out of business for good between 2008 - 2010. [
m.huffpost.com]
According to a Harvard study, an estimated 110K businesses were forced to permanently close from March through May of this year. [
www.nytimes.com]
Because the Harvard study only went through the beginning of May, I fully suspect that 110K estimate to increase (especially without additional assistance from the government).
In addition to the staggering amount of business closures (and job losses) experienced in both economic downturns: rent was not being paid (resulting in homelessness); car notes weren't being paid (resulting in repossessions); and, millions lost their healthcare coverage. All of these factors can (and likely did) lead to increased rates of suicide, alcohol/drug abuse, and DV.
But there are a couple of distinct differences that I believe will help folks navigate this current downturn better:
1) The Great Recession was caused (for the most part) by the fundamental breakdown of the country's financial sector. Without access to credit, businesses folded up and couldn't get back started until lending eased up.
Though you could argue there are still problems with the way our financial institutions are run today...they aren't the cause of what we're going through now. In fact, "the fundamentals of our economy" are stable. So, once a vaccine is produced, things should bounce back faster than what we saw in 2008.
2) Due to the passage of Obamacare (and the resulting expansion of medicaid) more displaced workers have access to healthcare today than they did when the Great Recession hit. This is important for the availability of mental health services during challenging times such as this.
3) Going back to #1, your average citizen didn't have a role in the creation of greedy money-making schemes like mortgage-backed securities. It was impossible for us to do anything to make that situation better.
The pandemic is different, though. It's agreed that only an effective vaccine will allow us to return to normalcy (assuming people take it). But until such time, it's inherently within our control to mitigate its affects so we can have an orderly return to a "somewhat normal" lifestyle.
Again, if someone is going to try to make the argument that the cure is worse than the disease...they need to come up with something that supports that. Otherwise, it appears as though it's just talk in support of some other agenda.
Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/18/2020 07:50PM by ramBRO.