Death Certificates: Suicide
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if her Department will consider reviewing the potential merits of listing a specific addiction as the cause of death by suicide on death certificates.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones
The Government has no plans to change the information which coroners are required to determine with regard to cause of death in cases of suicide.
The information recorded by the coroner in the Record of Inquest is dependent on the circumstances of the individual case and is at the coroner’s discretion as an independent judicial office holder. Any medical conditions mentioned in part 2 of the Record of Inquest must be known or suspected to have contributed to the death, and not simply be other conditions which were present at the time of death.
With regard to the possible contributory factors in a suicide, such as an addiction, it cannot be guaranteed that consistent and comprehensive information on a deceased person’s background will be made available to the coroner in every case. In addition, expecting coroners to routinely assess and record specific underlying conditions would take the coronial role fundamentally beyond its legal parameters, which are to determine who has died, and how, when and where they died.
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