You asked
Please provide the monthly figures for the number of suicides recorded so far in 2020 for January to September or as up to date as you are able to provide them.
If you are unable, for any reason to do this, please provide the total figure of reported suicides so far since 1st January 2020, with an explanation of the period that they were reported over.
We said
Thank you for your request.
Please see the following publication, with finalised suicide data: Suicides in the UK. This publication shows suicide data broken down by sex, age, area of usual residence, and suicide method. This is our most up-to-date annual publication, with deaths registered up to 2019.
We currently only hold the following provisional suicide data: Quarterly suicide death registrations in England: 2011 to 2019 and Quarter 1 and Quarter 2 of 2020 (provisional). Section two of this publication shows provisional suicide data for England with the most recent update including deaths that have been registered from January to June of 2020. The publication explains that the majority of suicides require an inquest, where a coroner must investigate the cause of death. The amount of time taken to hold an inquest causes a lag between the date the death occurred and the date the death is registered. We refer to this as a registration delay and registration delays for deaths caused by suicide tend to be five to six months on average. Because our data is based on death registrations, this delay means that most deaths recorded for 2020 so far would have occurred in 2019. More detailed information can be found in the publication.
Death registrations for 2020 will be finalised and released around early next year.