'Sickness' of suicides plagues South Korea

Ahn So-young hanged herself in January. She was 22. Like more than 12,000 South Koreans every year, Ahn chose suicide to escape her problems. She left a note saying she could not endure the shame of losing her job. Her father, Ahn Ki-min, hanged himself six weeks later. Neither gave warning to family or friends.

The country's suicide rate has accelerated at breathtaking speed in five years to become the highest of the 30-nation Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, with about 30 Koreans a day killing themselves.

The phenomenon was given greater prominence in recent months when two young celebrities, the actress Jeong Da-bin and the singer Yuni, hanged themselves.

The Korea Association for Suicide Prevention, founded in 2002, has just announced its programme for this year's Suicide Prevention Day. The September event has become a vital part of the group's strategy to counter Korea's suicide epidemic. This year, the group will call on all candidates in the December presidential election to declare their policy for reducing Korea's suicidal carnage.

"Our suicide rate is three times higher than it was 10 years ago and double what it was in 2002," says Hong Kang-e, a professor of psychiatry at Seoul National University and president of the anti-suicide group. "Suicide is now the leading cause of death among Koreans in their twenties and thirties."

Mr Hong's association says stress is a key factor, combined with a traditional reluctance to discuss personal problems.

Many experts are not optimistic. "Our society has a deep sickness," says Professor Whang Sang-min, a professor of psychology at Yonsei University.

"Two surveys said more than 60 per cent of Korean teenagers have considered suicide and more than 20 percent have made detailed plans for it."

Many of them have made their plans via the internet. The government has closed websites that aid group suicides. Between 1998 and 2006, there were 191 group suicides in Korea and, in a third of those cases, say researchers at Korea Naz-arene University, the planning was online.

The internet has also become a forum for Koreans to share suicidal thoughts, a phenomenon increasingly monitored by police and the internet safety commission. The government has ordered internet portals to close more than 700 suicide-related blogs in the past 12 months. Staff at Hong's association report seeing at least 100 new suicide blogs every month.

But the internet is not the root cause. Many research-ers cite the profound changes in Korea as it underwent an economic miracle. In going from an impoverished nation with an agrarian society to an industrial powerhouse with the world's 13th largest economy, Korea has demolished the traditional rules of family and clan.

Phenomenal growth has come with a high price. Korean workers put in 30 per cent more hours per day than employees in the UK or US. Their alcoholism rates are among the fastest-growing in the world, they have the lowest birth rate among the 20 biggest economies and their education and housing markets suffer from some of the world's highest prices.

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