The Troubling Link Between Allergies and Suicide

Early in his career, Teodor Postolache, a psychiatry professor at the University of Maryland, was struck by a peculiar trend that comes up again and again in suicide research. Across decades and in various countries, suicide is much more common in the spring and early summer than other times of year.

Now, Postolache and other researchers believe they have found a curious link between the season and self-harm: pollen-induced allergies.

In 2005, Postolache and his collaborators found that the suicide rate among young women doubled during peak pollen season, and the rate among older women went up by more than four-fold. Last year, researchers in Texas similarly found that suicide attempts in women rose with daily tree pollen counts in the Dallas area. And just last month, a paper published in Environmental Researchfound that increased pollen in the air raised the risk of suicide in women in Tokyo—meaning this dark trend might apply across cultures.

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