Jung Min-ho has worked as a staff writer at The Korea Times since 2012, mostly covering social and political issues. He currently belongs to the Politics & City Desk where he covers topics such as health, labor and human rights. Prior to joining the team, he was responsible for covering North Korea and sports. His article about a biosecurity breach of Middle East respiratory syndrome won him an award from the Korea Science Journalists Association in 2016. He is also the co-author of the book, "Medical Pioneers of Korea" (2019). He served as the head of the international relations committee at the Journalists Association of Korea from 2021 to 2023.
Suicide remains No. 1 cause of death among young Koreans
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By Jung Min-ho
Suicide remains the leading cause of death among young people in Korea, a report showed on Wednesday.
According to a study conducted on people aged between nine and 24, the suicide rate per 100,000 people in that age group stood at 10.8, by far the leading cause of death over accidents (3.9) and cancer (2.5).
This is an improvement compared to the previous year's 11.7. Suicide took the top spot for the first time in 2012, with the gap steadily widening compared to other causes until 2021.
The report, released by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, also demonstrated that 26 percent of middle and high school students said in a 2023 survey that they experienced depression over the past year, another improvement from the 28.7 percent registered in 2022.
Perhaps one of the most notable findings was the gradual increase in the number of students from multicultural families present in Korea. They now account for 3.5 percent of all students out of a total of 5.21 million elementary, middle and high school children from across the country. Ten years ago, the figure was approximately 1 percent.
Of the students from such families, 63.8 percent are elementary students.
However, the size of Korea’s total “school-age population” ― those aged between six and 21 ― fell to 7,147,000 this year from 7,302,000 in 2023.