Robin Williams' death has brought attention to the very real problem of suicide in the United States. From 2000 to 2011, suicides increased to 12.3 per 100,000 people from 10.4. Deaths by suicide now exceed those from motor-vehicle accidents.
This is not, as you might think, a problem occurring disproportionately among teenagers or the very old. The people most prone to taking their own lives are those 45 to 59 (Williams was 63). Suicides among those in their 50s have been rising especially fast: from 13 per 100,000 people in 1999 to 20 per 100,000 by 2010.
What puzzles researchers even more is that men commit suicide more often than women do — about four times as often — even though most studies find that women are twice as likely to be depressed and more likely to have suicidal thoughts. This discrepancy suggests an eightfold difference between the chances that a depressed man and a depressed woman will succeed in committing suicide.