Suicide and Ambient Temperature: A Multi-Country Multi-City Study

Background: Previous literature suggests that higher ambient temperature may play a role in increasing the risk of suicide. However, no multi-country study has explored the shape of the association and the role of moderate and extreme heat across different locations. Objectives: We examined the short-term temperature–suicide relationship using daily time-series data collected for 341 locations in 12 countries for periods ranging from 4 to 40 y. Methods: We conducted a two-stage meta-analysis. First, we performed location-specific time-stratified case-crossover analyses to examine the temperature–suicide association for each location. Then, we used a multivariate meta-regression to combine t…