Suicides and road traffic deaths in Russia: a comparative analysis of trends

Introduction: It has long been recognized that there are difficulties in obtaining valid mortality rates for suicides. The evidence indicated that suicides are sometimes misclassified and ‘‘hidden’’ as accidental. Suicide by motor vehicle crash is a recognized phenomenon, leading to under-reporting of the actual number of suicides and inaccuracies in the suicides mortality statistics. Road traffic accident mortality and the suicides rates in Russia are both among the highest in the world. This phenomenon has attracted much attention in recent years, but remains poorly understood. Aims: The present study aims to test the hypothesis of the close aggregate level link between road traffic accident mortality and the suicides rates in Russia. Methods: Trends in sex-specific road traffic accident mortality and the suicides rates from 1965 to 2015 were analyzed employing a distributed lags analysis in order to asses bivariate relationship between the two time series. Results: The graphical evidence suggests that the trends in both road traffic accident mortality and the suicides for male and female seem to follow each other across the time series. The results of analysis indicate the presence of a statistically significant association between the two time series for male at lag zero (Regres. Coef. 0,428; p