Documentation from WHO (in part):
(adapted from: World Health Organization. Figures and facts about suicide. WHO, Geneva, 1999)
According to WHO estimates, in the year 2000, approximately one million people died from suicide, and 10 to 20 times more people attempted suicide worldwide. This represents one death every 40 seconds and one attempt every 3 seconds, on average.
This also indicates that more people are dying from suicide than in all of the several armed conflicts around the world and, in many places, about the same or more than those dying from traffic accidents. In all countries, suicide is now one of the three leading causes of death among people aged 15-34 years; until recently, suicide was predominating among the elderly, but now suicide predominates in younger people in both absolute and relative terms, in a third of all countries.