ReviewFrontiers in public health2022
Lithium in Drinking Water as a Public Policy for Suicide Prevention: Relevance and Considerations.
Review in Frontiers in public health, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 12 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
12 citing papers in PubMed, 28 citations in OpenAlex.
- Curiositas - Psychiatric Puzzles.The Ulster medical journal · 2025Article
- Association Between Natural Lithium Exposure and Suicide Rate: An Ecological and Biomonitoring Study in Portugal.Nutrients · 2025Article
- History of Suicide Prevention with Lithium Treatment.Pharmaceuticals (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- Lithium Removal From Drinking Water.AWWA water science · 2025Article
- Lithium in Drinking Water and its Potential Impact on Mental Health: A Review.Current medicinal chemistry · 2025Review
- Article
- Lithium and its effects: does dose matter?International journal of bipolar disorders · 2024Review
- Assessment of Human Health Risk Indices Due to Metal Contamination in the Surface Water of the Negro River Sub-Basin, Áncash.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2024Article
- Prevention of suicidal behavior with lithium treatment in patients with recurrent mood disorders.International journal of bipolar disorders · 2024Review
- Estimating Lithium Concentrations in Groundwater Used as Drinking Water for the Conterminous United States.Environmental science & technology · 2024Article
- Article
- Lithium concentration in tap water, bottled mineral water, and Danube River water in Hungary.Scientific reports · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Although suicide is considered a major preventable cause of mortality worldwide, we do not have effective strategies to prevent it. Lithium has been consistently associated with lowering risk of suicide. This effect could occur at very low concentrations, such as trace doses of lithium in tap water. Several ecological studies and recent meta-analysis have suggested an inverse association between lithium in water and suicide in the general population, with a lack of knowledge of clinically significant side effects. This paper is aimed as a proposal to discuss the addition of lithium to drinking water to decrease the suicide rate. For this, we review the evidence available, use previous experiences, such as water fluoridation to prevent dental caries, and discuss the complexity involved in such a public policy. Considering the limited data available and the controversies contained in this proposal, we suggest that a consensus on lithium concentration in water is needed, where the suicide rates start to reduce, as happened with water fluoridation. This measure will require to develop community-controlled trials with strict monitoring of any side effects, where democratic procedures would constitute one of the most appropriate ways to validate its implementation according to the reality of each community.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.