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This Article Figures Only Full Text Full Text (PDF) All Versions of this Article: AJPH.2008.146183v1 99/5/915    most recent Submit a response View Shopping Cart Alert me when this article is cited Alert me when eLetters are posted Alert me if a correction is posted Services Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Pridemore, W. A. Articles by Snowden, A. J. Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Pridemore, W. A. Articles by Snowden, A. J. Related Collections Epidemiology Health Policy Injury/Emergency Care/Violence Mortality Alcohol Other Environment

William Alex Pridemore, PhD and Aleksandra J. Snowden, MA

The authors are with the Department of Criminal Justice, Indiana University, Bloomington.

Correspondence: Requests for reprints should be sent to William Alex Pridemore, PhD, Indiana University, Department of Criminal Justice, 302 Sycamore Hall, Bloomington, IN 47405 (e-mail: wpridemo{at}indiana.edu).

Objectives. We assessed the impact on suicide mortality of a new national policy in Slovenia that limits the availability of alcohol.

Methods. We obtained monthly total, male, and female suicide counts in Slovenia between January 1997 and December 2005 and then employed autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) techniques to model the effect of the alcohol policy (implemented in March 2003).

Results. There was a significant decrease in the total number of monthly suicides following the policy's implementation. Subsequent analyses revealed this association to be caused solely by the impact on male suicides. Specifically, there was an immediate and permanent reduction of 3.6 male suicides per month (95% confidence interval = –0.4, –6.9), or approximately 10% of the preintervention average. The policy had no statistically significant effect on female suicides.

Conclusions. Our results show the effectiveness of this specific policy in reducing male suicides in Slovenia and also hint at the potential of public policy in reducing the public health burden of alcohol-related harm more generally.

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