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. 2022 Sep 19;22(1):1776.
doi: 10.1186/s12889-022-14175-9.

The burden of mental health-related mortality in the Baltic States in 2007-2018

Daumantas Stumbrys  1 , Domantas Jasilionis  2   3 , Dainius Pūras  4
Affiliations

The burden of mental health-related mortality in the Baltic States in 2007-2018

Daumantas Stumbrys et al. BMC Public Health. .

Abstract

Background: The problem of underestimating the burden of mental health-related mortality is widely discussed in the public health literature. Relevant scientific evidence from societies experiencing the largest burden of mental health mortality is important for better understanding global and national mental health challenges and improving policies. Three Baltic States - Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia - are countries in the Central and Eastern European region that experienced post-soviet transition trauma and showed among the highest suicide and alcohol-related mortality rates in Europe. This study aimed to examine the change in the burden of mental health-related mortality in three Baltic States in the context of consistent growth in life expectancy in 2007-2018.

Methods: We calculated age-standardized years of life lost due to specific mental health-related causes of death in three Baltic countries from 2007 to 2018. Four mental health-related causes of death groups were analyzed: (i) all mental and behavioural disorders; (ii) intentional self-harm; (iii) main substance use-related causes of death; and (iv) external causes of death. The number of deaths came from the WHO Mortality Database; population exposures were extracted from the Human Mortality Database.

Results: We found that the proportion of age-standardized years of life lost due to mental disorders was relatively low in all three countries. It varied from 0.2% for females in Lithuania in 2009 to 2.4% for males in Estonia in 2007. However, the proportion of age-standardized years of life lost from self-harm and substance use remained high. In 2018, the proportion of age-standardized years of life lost due to self-harm was highest among males in Lithuania (4.1%) while the highest proportion due to substance use-related causes of death was among males in Estonia (7.3%).

Conclusions: Our findings indicate that the burden of mental health-related mortality remained high and showed divergent temporal changes across the three countries. In the context of the Baltic States and other post-soviet countries, fractions of various external causes of death and alcohol-related causes of death should be considered in assessing the total burden of mental health-related mortality.

Keywords: Alcohol; Baltic States; Estonia; Latvia; Lithuania; Mental health; Mortality; Suicide; Years of life lost.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Male and female life expectancy in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania from 1959 to 2018. Three curves at the top of the chart represent female life expectancy changes, three curves at the bottom of the chart represent male life expectancy changes. Two vertical grey dotted lines show the start of the period in 2007 and the end of the period in 2018. Data source: the Human Mortality Database [9]
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Change in age-standardized years of life lost from mental health-related causes of death groups, in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in 2007-2018. Standard life expectancy for the year 2050 provided by WHO Global Health Estimates [29] and Standard European population of 2013 [30] was applied in calculations
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Composition of age-standardized years of life lost from mental health-related causes of death groups by age group, in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in 2007 and 2018. Standard life expectancy for the year 2050 provided by WHO Global Health Estimates [29] and Standard European population of 2013 [30] was applied in calculations
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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