Fatal fallout of financial failure

Economic woes in Asia a decade ago heralded rapid increases in suicide rates in hard-hit places

When an economy goes bad in a hurry, lives aren’t just ruined — tragically, they’re sometimes lost. A currency collapse that spread across much of Asia from July 1997 to January 1998 was closely related to an abrupt upsurge in suicide rates in economically devastated Japan, Hong Kong and South Korea, a new study finds.