Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition
Swissinfo reported on July 10, 2025 that the elder suicide rate has quadrupled over the past 25 years. It is important to note that the suicide rates for people under the age of 65 have dropped over the past 25 years while suicide rate for people over the age of 65 but under 84 has increased significantly and the suicide rate for people over the age of 85 has quadrupled.
Senior citizens were 42 times more likely to take their own lives in 2023 than people in other age groups, according to Swiss public broadcaster, RTS.
And the numbers are increasing: in the past 25 years, the proportion of over 85-year-olds in Switzerland who decide to take their life has quadrupled. Among 65- to 84-year-olds, this proportion has doubled.
In contrast, the suicide rate among the younger population has fallen by around 30% in the past two decades.
The increased suicide rate, in Switzerland, appears to be related to the increase in suicide deaths. Swissinfo examined the question as to whether suicide is linked to assisted suicide and reported:
There is controversy among experts as to whether assisted suicides and unassisted suicides can be linked at all.
According to Pierre Vandel, head physician at Lausanne University Hospital, “it is possible to opt for assisted suicide without having suicidal thoughts”. However, he explains that some of his colleagues make no distinction in this respect.
Euthanasia organisations take a different view. “Conscious suicides are different from others,” says Jean-Jacques Bise, Co-President of Exit in French-speaking Switzerland.
The figures from RTS suggest that the two types of suicide could be linked. In very old people, the statistical curves of the two types of suicide cross at the beginning of the 2010s, an indication that from then on there was a shift from unaccompanied to accompanied suicides.
The article also examined the differences between men and women. The article stated:
The figures also show that there are stark differences between men and women. Until the early 2010s, women took their own lives much less frequently than men.
Since then, the number of assisted suicides has also risen sharply among women, and women almost exclusively end their lives in this way of their own accord. In contrast, there is still a comparatively high proportion of unassisted suicides among men.
“Men express their feelings less than women,” explains psychiatrist Pierre Vandel. That is why it is more difficult for them to recognise suicidal thoughts and help them in time. This explains the tendency of men to take their own lives more often without support.
There have been several studies that have examined the connection between suicide, euthanasia and assisted suicide. Most studies appear to suggest that the suicide rate increases when assisted suicide and euthanasia are normalized.
In America, a similar phenomenon has occurred. Like Switzerland the highest suicide rate in America is among the elderly. Similar to Switzerland, the suicide rate among the elderly was much lower in the past. There is significant proof that the suicide rate in Oregon is directly connected to the acceptance of assisted suicide.
- Suicide deaths increasing in America. Elderly Americans now have the highest suicide rate (Link).
- US suicide rates are now highest among the elderly (Link).
- Suicide contagion (Link).
- Legalizing assisted dying can actually increase suicides (Link).
- Suicide rates in jurisdictions that have legalized assisted suicide are not decreasing (Link).