Suicide Risk Factors and Signs

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A recent Chinese study found a link between oral microbes and suicidal tendencies in high school students.

A study from Iran found a reduction in microbial diversity in the guts of suicidal subjects.

Diet can improve gut dysbiosis, improving the function of the gut-brain axis.

“If you’re going through hell, keep going.” –Winston Churchill

“If you’re going through hell, keep going.” –Winston Churchill

Shockingly, suicide is the second leading cause of death for people between the ages of 18 and 29 years. For friends and family, it is heartbreaking.

These days, we’re highly connected yet lonely, our jobs are being stolen by artificial intelligence (AI) and robots, climate change is clouding our future, and pandemics are no longer theoretical. Stressors abound. But there is another factor hidden inside our bodies that may also be a threat to our mental state: microbes.

An exploratory study in 2021 from the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston found little correlation between suicide and gut microbes, but it wasn’t the last word. In the intervening years, new studies have found important new connections.

A recent Chinese study found a link between oral microbes and suicidal tendencies in high school students. They compared 45 healthy controls to 45 kids with suicidal ideation and found a microbial connection.

In particular, they found Enterobacter, Escherichia, Shigella, and Parabacteroides in the oral microbiome of the suicidal kids. In contrast, the healthy controls had higher levels of Rikenellaceae and Alistipes.

Microbiomes are an ecosystem writ small, and like any good ecology, diversity is the key to resilience. If rabbits are the only food available for the bobcats, then when rabbits die out, the bobcats will soon follow. But if there are multiple prey animals, the bobcats have much better odds of survival.

Sure enough, the microbial diversity of suicidal kids was significantly lower than........

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