Although stable, orderly, safe and successful, Uruguay is Latin America’s suicide central

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Uruguay, the tiny nation squeezed between big Argentina and giant Brazil, is a successful country. It is stable and economically prosperous. It is safe, orderly, and reasonable. But as it turns out, the people there don’t really seem to be happy.

Last year, the number of self-murders continued to rise in Uruguay, a country where the rate was already at a record high. In 2021, there were 758 cases there, or 21.39  per 100,000 population, for a global average rate of 9.48 suicides per 100,000.

Not even in the financial crisis of 2002 had such a high figure been reached. At that time, 20.62 people per 100,000 inhabitants took their own lives in Uruguay.

If the annual ups and downs are left aside, suicide has been on the rise for more than two decades.

Read also: Check out our coverage on Uruguay

According to official figures from the Ministry of Public Health, the rise in suicides in men largely explains the global increase. It was already known that women ask for more help than men, that eight out of ten suicides were from men, and that machismo weighs even on the way of dying.

In numbers, it looks like this: for every 100,000 men, 36.38 committed suicide in the year. But out of every 100,000 women, a fifth took their own lives.

The east of the country concentrates the highest suicide rates. But Rocha, which was once the department with the worst figures, was surpassed by Treinta y Tres.

NEIGHBORING COUNTRIES ARE POORER AND HAPPIER

Worldwide there are only 12 countries whose population is even more unhappy:

Lesotho
Guyana
Eswatini
South Korea
Kiribati
Micronesia
Lithuania
Suriname
Russia
South Africa
Ukraine
Belarus

In Latin America, the next highest-ranked country Argentina had just 8.4 suicides per 100,000, which is below the global average.

It was followed by Costa Rica with 8.1, Ecuador with 7.6, Brazil with 6.9, and Bolivia with 6.2.