General foresees end to grim rise in Army suicides

http://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2013/03/07/general-foresees-end-to-grim-rise-in-army-suicides

General foresees end to grim rise in Army suicides
By ROBERT BURNS, Associated Press
March 7, 2013

WASHINGTON (AP) — Army suicides are still increasing, but the four-star general who has been at the forefront of seeking solutions, Lloyd J. Austin III, says he thinks a turnaround is in sight.

"The trends are not going in the direction that we want them to go — they haven't been for some time," Austin told The Associated Press in his last interview as the Army's vice chief of staff. He nonetheless spoke optimistically of "doing the right things to begin to turn this around," despite the suicide rate worsening during his 13-month watch.

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Last year the Army, and the military as a whole, suffered the highest number of suicides ever recorded, prompting then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to declare it an epidemic.

The Army had 183 suicides among active-duty soldiers, up from 167 in 2011, and the military as a whole had 350, up from 301 the year before. This year began on an even worse note, with the Army reporting 19 suicides among active-duty soldiers in January, up from 16 the previous January, in addition to 14 among those in the National Guard and Reserve, up from six in January 2012.