8 million Americans consider suicide: Study

More than 8 million Americans seriously consider suicide each year, according to a new government study.

About 32,000 suicides occur in the United States each year, but a new study by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration indicates that many more give the idea serious thought.

The new SAMHSA report is based on a survey of 46,190 people aged 18 and older. In the past, the question about suicide had only been asked of people who reported major depression but in 2008 it was added to all questionnaires.

Other findings:

• People 18 to 25 years old were far more likely to have seriously considered suicide in the previous year (6.7 percent) than those 26 to 49 (3.9 percent).

• Just 2.3 percent seriously considered suicide among those 50 or older.

• Among people with a substance abuse disorder, 11 percent had considered suicide, compared to 3 percent for people without such disorders.

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Facebook, MySpace encouraging Suicide'

The Catholic Church in England has warned that websites such as Facebook and MySpace are pushing teenagers to view friendship as a "commodity" and ultimately leading them to commit suicide.

Archbishop Nichols, who is the head of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, blamed social network sites for leaving children with impoverished friendships. He stressed that the internet and mobile phones were "dehumanising" community life and that relationships had been weakened by the decline in face-to-face meetings.

"I think there's a worry that an excessive use or an almost exclusive use of text and emails means that as a society we're losing some of the ability to build interpersonal communication that's necessary for living together and building a community," the Archbishop of Westminster was quoted as saying by the Daily Telegraph on Sunday.

Underlining that he was "wary" about Facebook and MySpace, the top bishop warned that the sites are contributing to a trend for teenagers to put too much importance on the number of friends they have and that this can ultimately lead to suicide.

The top bishop also raised concerns about the rise of individualism. He described footballers who break their contracts to move to other clubs for bigger salaries as "mercenaries" and said moves to loosen laws on assisted suicide were particularly worrying.

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