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9
It will be noticed from the above table that there
is a great variation from year to year and that Hampstead does
not consistently show the highest rate. Furthermore the actual
numbers of suicides are small and therefore any deductions made
from the figures can only be extremely tentative. It would be
unwise to make any deductions from the figures for Holborn.
In the country as a whole, the figures for suicides
have shown a decrease year by year since 1949. Prior to this,
after a slight increase in the first years of the war there
was a marked decline during the middle of the war and then a
rise in the first years of peace, which reached its maximum in
1948 - 49. The Hampstead figures have more or less followed
this trend.
The metropolitan boroughs with the highest death
rates for suicide are Hampstead, Holborn, Westminster, Paddington,
St. Marylebone, Wandsworth, Kensington and Chelsea. With the
exception of Wandsworth all these boroughs adjoin, forming the
north-western section of the County of London.
As I have already pointed out in my Annual Report for
1953, these boroughs have many other features in common,
including the large percentage of their population living in
lodgings, boarding houses and rooms, and it is possible that
they house a large number of people who have left their own
homes and familiar surroundings, attracted by stories of the
wealth and opportunity awaiting them in London, the biggest
city of the commonwealth.
In the national figures the ratio of males to females
for suicide is 1.8 males to 1 female. The figures for Hampstead
vary from year to year. In 1951 the ratio was 1.3 to 1 and
in 1950 it was nearer 2 to 1, whilst the provisional figures for
1953 seem to suggest a figure of 1 to 2. These figures for
Hampstead demonstrate clearly the rashness of making deductions
from such small figures.
The national figures consistently show that the male
rates increase with advancing age. This is also more or less
a feature of the Hampstead figures with the exception of the
marked excess in the ages 55 - 59. The women on the other hand,
in the national figures, reach a maximum incidence at ages of '
55 - 64 which then declines with increasing age. In Hampstead
this rise and fall is not so clearly shown.