The answer remains elusive and complex. But a new report offers some clarity, finding the Beehive State’s high altitude may play a role.
“Growing evidence, based on large data sets, suggests that altitude of residence is specifically associated with increased risk of suicide and depression,” conclude a trio of University of Utah researchers, who recently published their review of medical literature in the Harvard Review of Psychiatry. They found altitude also may make popular antidepressants less effective.
Experts suggest many factors play into the state’s high suicide rate, from widespread gun ownership, to a stoic cowboy mentality that is common in some rural Western communities, to the influence of religion.