Finno-Ugrians, Blood Types, and Suicide: Comment on Voracek, Fisher, and Marusic

Ancestry and different rates of suicide and homicide in European countries: A study with population-level data

INTRODUCTION

There are large differences in suicide rates across Europe. The current study investigated the relationship of suicide and homicide rates in different countries of Europe with ancestry as it is defined with the haplotype frequencies of Y-DNA and mtDNA.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

The mortality data were retrieved from the WHO online database. The genetic data were retrieved from http://www.eupedia.com. The statistical analysis included Forward Stepwise Multiple Linear Regression analysis and Pearson Correlation Coefficient (R).

RESULTS

In males, N and R1a Y-DNA haplotypes were positively related to both homicidal and suicidal behaviors while I1 was negatively related. The Q was positively related to the homicidal rate. Overall, 60-75% of the observed variance was explained. L, J and X mtDNA haplogroups were negatively related with suicide in females alone, with 82-85% of the observed variance described.

DISCUSSION

The current study should not be considered as a study of genetic markers but rather a study of human ancestry. Its results could mean that research on suicidality has a strong biological but locally restricted component and could be limited by the study population; generalizability of the results at an international level might not be possible. Further research with patient-level data are needed to verify whether these haplotypes could serve as biological markers to identify persons at risk to commit suicide or homicide and whether biologically-determined ancestry could serve as an intermediate grouping method or even as an endophenotype in suicide research.

Differential correlation of suicide and homicide rates according to geographical areas: A study with population-level data

The current study investigated the relationship of suicide and homicide rates internationally. WHO database mortality data for 82 countries concerning suicide, homicides, and cancer and traffic accidents as controls were used. The analysis included Pearson correlation and multiple linear regression analysis. Worldwide homicidal rates explained 55.42%, 43.86% and 41.7% of male and 22.0%, 22.14% and 13.25% of female suicides for 2000, 2005 and 2010 respectively. In Europe there was a positive correlation between male suicide rates and all homicide rates including homicide rates in both genders, in male victims, and in female victims. In America there is no significant correlation. In Asia there is a significant correlation of male suicidal rates only with homicide rates of female victims. We observed marked and interesting differences in the pattern of association between Europe and the Americas. Overall the current paper suggests that at least in some human populations, suicidality and homicidality share common etiopathogenetic substrates and could be triggered by the same internal or external events or might develop based on common genetic background. Empirically it has been suggested that suicide is related to higher living standards while murder is related to poor quality of life and lower living standards.

Some problems of research on the association between blood types and suicide mortality: comment on Lester (2004)

This is a comment on the ecological finding of a negative association of national suicide rate and national proportion of people with Type O blood (Lester, 2004). Current knowledge on this topic is reviewed and several problems, limitations, and discrepancies within this research line are noted. Specifically, it is suggested that (1) this association appears to have been subject to attenuation recently; (2) available ecological evidence on this association is contradictory to both individual-level findings on the same topic and similar ecological-level findings pertaining to personality-related risk factors and antecedents of suicide; (3) a negative association of one of the four ABO phenotypes with suicide mortality does not help single out phenotypes with possibly increased suicide risk; and (4) genetic suicide risk factors may well be associated with other ABO phenotypes than Type O and may further coincide with other blood polymorphisms than the ABO system.

Variation in European suicide rates is better accounted for by latitude and longitude than by national percentage of Finno-Ugrians and Type O blood: a rebuttal of Lester and Kondrichin (2004)

The variation in contemporary suicide rates for men and women across 20 European nations is, in terms of shared variance, better accounted for by latitude and longitude than by national percentage of Finno-Ugrians and Type O blood, thus supporting the conclusion of Voracek, et al. in 2003 and refuting the supposition of Lester and Kondrichin of 2004. Discussion focuses on possible bases of this finding and on research problems pertaining to relations between suicide and blood type.

Suicide rate and blood groups: an ecological study of 39 nations

Across 29 European and 10 non-European nations, contemporary suicide rates for men and women were negatively correlated with national proportions of people with Type O blood, thus replicating and extending findings of Lester (1987) and Lester and Kondrichin (2004).