Alcohol as a factor in growth causes of suicides in the Soviet Union and in former soviet countries

An extraordinary increase in the suicide rates observed in 1986 - 1994 years in the USSR, and after 1991 in many post-Soviet states. It was most pronounced in the Baltic States, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Moldova, but it was less significant in the states of Central Asia and Transcaucasia. Typically, this increase of suicides account for social and economic changes in these countries after 1991. It is shown in the article that the dynamics of consumption of alcoholic beverages reveals the greatest correlation with the frequency of suicide. Reducing the suicide rate since 1991 occurred at a high level of total alcohol consumption. However, while there has been a decrease in consumption of alcoholic beverages with a significant increase in beer consumption. Reducing suicides were also observed in other countries, where there was a decrease of consumption of liquor with an increase in beer consumption. It seems that an important factor in reducing suicide rates (and alcohol poisoning) is a change in the structure of alcohol consumption, namely the reduction in consumption of spirits, especially vodka, produced of rectified spirit, with an increase in beer consumption.