THE north has the highest suicide rate in Ireland and Britain for the second year in a row, alarming new statistics reveal.
During 2014 there were 16.5 suicides registered per 100,000 of the population in Northern Ireland, according to the Office for National Statistics.
Scotland had the second-highest rate at 14.5, followed by 10.3 in England and 9.2 in Wales.
Over the same period the suicide rate was 10 in the Republic, according to its Central Statistics Office.
It is the second consecutive year that Northern Ireland has recorded a higher suicide rate than both the south and Britain.
The figures come amid fresh fears over the north's growing suicide problem. More people have now died from suicide in Northern Ireland in the years since the Good Friday Agreement than were killed during the Troubles.
And suicides registered over the same period since 1998 were almost double the number of deaths caused by road crashes.
More than three quarters of those who died by suicide were men.
Some academics have cited the decades of conflict as possibly being linked to some of those who have taken their own lives.
Last month The Irish News revealed that the Stormont executive's ministerial taskforce on suicide has failed to meet since April 2015.
The Ministerial Coordination Group on Suicide Prevention was set up a decade ago in a bid to combat suicide rates in Northern Ireland.
All executive ministers apart from the finance minster sit on the panel, which aims to encourage a coordinated approach across Stormont departments on suicide and mental health issues.
However, it has only met on 11 occasions during that time, with the gap between some meetings stretching to nearly three years.
Campaigners branded the absence of meetings an "absolute disgrace" and accused politicians of failing to take suicide seriously.
In an attempt to address the north's growing suicide problem, the Programme for Government 2008-11 set a target of an average annual death rate of 10.7 per 100,000 of population for 2010-12.
But the executive failed to meet this target, with the latest statistics showing a rate of 16.5 in 2014.
A total of 3,859 deaths due to suicide were registered in Northern Ireland from the beginning of 1998 to the end of 2014.
Back in 1998 when the Good Friday Agreement was signed, 150 suicides were registered.
The figure has generally increased in the years since, passing the 200 mark for the first time in 2005 and in 2014 it reached 268.
The issue was thrown into stark focus just weeks ago when a family bravely spoke out to urge young people against suicide after suffering the horror of three tragedies in less than a year.
Colleen Lagan (28), from Ardoyne in north Belfast, tragically took her own life on Christmas Day – within 10 months of losing two cousins to suicide.
