The suicide rate among Muscovites has been gradually declining since 2010, a city official said Tuesday.
"The statistics look like this: In 2010, 1,234 suicides were registered; in 2011 there were 1,113; in 2012, 1,058; in 2013, 972; and in 2014 there were 832, while over the first two months of 2015 there were 128 suicides registered in Moscow," Leonid Pechatnikov, deputy mayor for social issues, was cited as saying by Interfax news agency.
In February, the city saw 70 cases of suicide. Ten of those cases involved people with cancer.
Pechatnikov dismissed speculation that the cancer patients had killed themselves over difficulties acquiring painkillers — an issue that brought the Health Ministry under scrutiny last year — saying seven of the 10 people suffering from cancer who took their own lives were not yet aware of their diagnoses, which only emerged in the course of autopsies.
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