ArticlePLOS global public health2022
Suicide and self-harm in low- and middle- income countries during the COVID-19 pandemic: A systematic review.
Article in PLOS global public health, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 23 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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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.
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Who cites it
23 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 60 citations in OpenAlex.
- Suicide before and during the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Systematic Review with Meta-Analysis.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2023Pooled it
- Age-period-cohort effects on suicide mortality in Andalusia, Spain (2000-2024): demographic masking and sustained pandemic excess.Social psychiatry and psychiatric epidemiology · 2026Article
- Suicidal ideation and suicide attempts in eight low- and middle-income countries: a comparison of national surveys.BMC psychiatry · 2026Article
- Correction: Suicide and self-harm in low- and middle- income countries during the COVID-19 pandemic: A systematic review.PLOS global public health · 2026Article
- Mental health and macroeconomics: economic and social determinants that explain suicide in Ecuador.Frontiers in public health · 2026Article
- Psychosocial and contextual risk factors of adolescent deliberate poisoning: a multicentre case-control study in Sri Lanka.BMJ paediatrics open · 2025Article
- The impact of COVID-19 and public health measures on homicide and suicide trends in Botswana using an interrupted time series analysis.Injury epidemiology · 2025Article
- Alcohol restrictions and suicide rates in South Africa during the COVID-19 pandemic: results of a natural experiment.BMJ global health · 2025Article
- Suicidal behaviours and self-harm among adolescents: Results from a school-based mental health survey in the Philippines.Global mental health (Cambridge, England) · 2025Article
- Global Suicide Mortality Rates (2000-2019): Clustering, Themes, and Causes Analyzed through Machine Learning and Bibliographic Data.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2024Article
- Identifying Reddit Users at a High Risk of Suicide and Their Linguistic Features During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Growth-Based Trajectory Model.Journal of medical Internet research · 2024Article
- How Mental Health and Suicidality Changed during the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Longitudinal Study in the General and Psychiatric Population Illustrating Risk and Protective Factors.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Further evidence of misclassification of the injury deaths in South Africa: When will the barriers to accurate injury death statistics be removed?South African medical journal = Suid-Afrikaanse tydskrif vir geneeskunde · 2023Article
- Changes in suicide in California from 2017 to 2021: a population-based study.Injury epidemiology · 2023Article
- Leveraging research, community and collaboration towards robust COVID-19 mental health response in the Caribbean.Lancet regional health. Americas · 2023Review
- The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic and Lockdowns on Self-Poisoning and Suicide in Sri Lanka: An Interrupted Time Series Analysis.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2023Article
- Changes in self-harm and suicide in California from 2017-2021: a population-based study.Research square · 2023Article
- Prevalence of mental disorders in South Asia: A systematic review of reviews.Global mental health (Cambridge, England) · 2023Article
- NSSI questionnaires revisited: A data mining approach to shorten the NSSI questionnaires.PloS one · 2023Article
- Has the COVID-19 pandemic influenced suicide rates differentially according to socioeconomic indices and ethnicity? More evidence is needed globally.Epidemiology and psychiatric sciences · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issued
Authors and funding
13 authors at 8 institutions in 5 countries.
Funding
Abstract
There is widespread concern over the potential impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on suicide and self-harm globally, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMIC) where the burden of these behaviours is greatest. We synthesised the evidence from the published literature on the impact of the pandemic on suicide and self-harm in LMIC. This review is nested within a living systematic review (PROSPERO ID CRD42020183326) that continuously identifies published evidence (all languages) through a comprehensive automated search of multiple databases (PubMed; Scopus; medRxiv, PsyArXiv; SocArXiv; bioRxiv; the WHO COVID-19 database; and the COVID-19 Open Research Dataset by Semantic Scholar (up to 11/2020), including data from Microsoft Academic, Elsevier, arXiv and PubMed Central.) All articles identified by the 4th August 2021 were screened. Papers reporting on data from a LMIC and presenting evidence on the impact of the pandemic on suicide or self-harm were included. Methodological quality was assessed using an appropriate tool, and a narrative synthesis presented. A total of 22 studies from LMIC were identified representing data from 12 countries. There was an absence of data from Africa, the Pacific, and the Caribbean. The reviewed studies mostly report on the early months of COVID-19 and were generally methodologically poor. Few studies directly assessed the impact of the pandemic. The most robust evidence, from time-series studies, indicate either a reduction or no change in suicide and self-harm behaviour. As LMIC continue to experience repeated waves of the virus and increased associated mortality, against a backdrop of vaccine inaccessibility and limited welfare support, continued efforts are needed to track the indirect impact of the pandemic on suicide and self-harm in these countries.
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.