ABSTRACT
The psychiatric literature on suicide tends to give emphasis to the demographic and social aspects. We know that completed suicide is commoner in men than in women, whereas for attempted suicide the relation is reversed. Social isolation and the loss of important supporting structures which give meaning to life (such as employment and family bonds) are very important risk factors for suicide. Coming nearer the individual, we know that there is a clear link between depression and suicide, although there is a tendency for this to be rather overstated. It is likely that a very signi®cant number of completed suicides and attempted suicides occur in the context of personality disorder, where, as a result of the high degree of dissociation, depressive affect is minimal. From a psychoanalytic perspective, the distinction between personality disorder and illness is in any case less clear.2
