Report Paul Murphy
The fact that men account for four in every five suicides was borne out at inquests held at Trim Courthouse when the majority who died by their own hand showed a predominance of men. Three out of the four suicide inquests presided over by Meath County Coroner Nathaniel Lacy were for male victims and the average age was 43.
A report by Movember’ Real Face of Men’s Health this week, produced I conjunction with the Men’s Health Forum and National Centre for Men’s Health showed that mental health remain a critical concern with over b97 per cent of GPs surveyed seeing male patients with suicidal behaviour in the past year. On average, doctors saw 15 male patients per year with suicidal thoughts, with most cases being in the 18-34 and 35-54 age groups. Director of Policy at Movember, Cliona Fitzpatrick, said mental health was a massive issue. “The findings from this report we see that men are 1.7 times more likely to die from, we call them ‘external causes’ , than women”.
The first inquest concerned the death of a 42-year-old man in an area nine kilometres from Navan in 2024. The man’s wife sought a welfare call from Gardai. A Garda later discovered the man’s body in a garden behind a premises. A brother of the deceased later identified the body to Gardai. A second inquest concerned the death of 31-year-old woman who was found deceased by her father in a shed at the rear of a house in Ashbourne shortly after lunchtime and Gardai were notified.
Another inquest concerned the death in August 2024 of a 22-year-old man near Kells whose mother had found him deceased. She said she had been on a visit to the West of Ireland leaving her son at home because he had exams. She said she had left her friends at Dublin Airport and on her way home stopped to have something to eat. She texted her son but he did not text back. That was not unusual, she said in a statement. She phoned but he did not answer. When she got home at about 8pm she went to her son’s room and found him deceased.
The inquest session was told about the death of a 77-year-old man who died in a house in central Navan in 2021. Gardai gave evidence of having gone to the house and found the man deceased. In a statement read at the inquest the deceased’s wife said that she had been out of the house with her daughter and when she returned had found her husband had passed away. His health had been deteriorating for some time, she said.
Each of the four inquests was attended by Gardai involved in investigations at each scene or their statements were read to the inquests by Inspector Alan Roughneen. Professor Muna Sabah, pathologist, who gave evidence of carrying out post mortem on each person also attended. In each case Mr Lacy and Inspector Roughneen expressed their condolences to the families of the deceased.
