LONDON, Sept. 7 (Xinhua) -- London has the lowest suicide rate of any area in England, figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) revealed Thursday.
The ONS report showed that in 2016 a total of 5,688 people in Britain, three quarters of them male, decided to end it all.
The total was 3.4 percent fewer than in 2015, the third year in a row that has seen a fall in suicides.
ONS said compared to registration year 2015, the English rate has fallen a significant amount, the Welsh rate has fallen slightly, and the Scottish rate has risen a small amount.
In 2016, the South West region of England had the highest suicide rate for any English region at 11.2 per 100,000 people, while London has the lowest at 7.8 per 100,000 people.
Scotland, though, had the highest levels of suicide among any part of Britain, scoring 15 per 100,000 people, double the London suicide rate.
The highest suicide rate was among people aged 40 to 44, at 15.1 per 100,000. The same age group also had the highest rate among males at 23.7 per 100,000.
The number of suicides, according to the ONS statistics, has continued a downward trend since 1988 when it reached 14 per 100,000 people in Britain.
Although there was a sudden rise in 2013, the trend for fewer suicides has continued.
Hanging and poisoning remained the most common methods people used to end their lives, the figures show, with women more the twice as likely than men choosing poisoning.
