Alaska’s social indicators continue to decline

[sasha031]

State has among the highest rates of suicide, rape, alcoholism, and illegal drug use
By: Alaska Humanity News New reports from government agencies indicate that rape and prison incarceration rates in Alaska, already among the highest in the United States, continue to increase. Alaska is also maintaining its position as the state with the highest per capita rate of alcoholism and illegal drug use.
The suicide rate for Alaskans remains among the highest in the United States, at 19.6 per 100,000, according to a report published by the Alaska Statewide Suicide Prevention Council in April, 2005. This is nearly twice the incidence of suicide in the rest of the United States. The report indicates that suicide rates in villages are substantially greater than in urban areas, but that the suicide rate in Anchorage is 50 percent higher than the U.S. average.

The University of Alaska Justice Center reports that Alaska has the highest rate of forcible rape, and that Anchorage had the second highest rate in U.S. metropolitan areas. Rapes occur at a rate of 79.5 per 100,000 in Alaska, and 82.01 in Anchorage, compared with an average rate in the United Sates of 39.95 per 100,000. Alaska’s rape rate is 2.4 times the national average. Recent trends in forcible rape indicate that the situation is getting worse. The rate of forcible rape has increased by 27% in the past six years, according to a report published on a UAA Justice Center website. During this period the rate has declined by 3 percent in the United States.
A report released on April 23 by the U.S. Bureau of Justice indicates that the number of people held in United States and Alaska prisons continues to increase. The U.S. incarceration rate was already the highest in the world. According to the report, the number of prisoners in Alaska increased from 4,431 in 2003 to 4,515 in 2004, a 1.9% increase. There are a total of 2.1 million people in American jails, one in every 138 U.S. residents, an increase of 1%.

http://www.humanitynews.net/index.php/main/more/news_article_alaskas_social_indicators_continue_to_decline/

[sasha031]

1. what is going on up there

it could of been and could be a sanctuary if they ever woke up. This is a result of the right wing of having a stronghold for who know how long.

[fed_up_mother]

2. It's fricking cold, and half the year it's pretty dark

Look at the countries in northern Europe. Their suicide rates are higher than south and central Europe, if I remember correctly.

And many of the residents have a strong libertarian streak, so they tend not to vote for programs that could improve the situation.

[Blue_In_AK]

6. There are many factors at work up here

that make these rates so dismal, and it doesn't all have to do with the right wing. This state has always had a high rate of alcoholism and sexual assault for as long as I've lived here (since 1975), and I'm sure long before that, through Republican administrations and Democratic administrations. I think a lot has to do with the isolation, the fact that the vast majority of the state can't be reached by roads, even though there are a lot of people living out there. It's difficult to get services and programs out to the far-flung villages and towns, and the cost is phenomenal. Even the troopers have to be flown in when there's a crime committed in a small village.

There is tension between rural and urban, subsistence and store-bought. Young people in the villages are trapped between two cultures, what they see on TV (yes, they do have TV out there) and the reality of their lives. People from the Bush who move into the cities suffer culture shock and some slip into homelessness and despair.

There's also kind of a wild-west culture up here, a macho thing that goes on. I could say more, but we're getting ready to leave for the weekend.

These are complicated issues, and there are no easy solutions.

[sasha031]

7. thanks for sharing

the cultural and social dynamics we have in different parts of the country. We or I on the outside look at Alaska look as a paradise,(mind you I have never been there, yet)because it's the last frontier for someone who loves the environment.

but nothing is that simple.

[jdlh8894]

3. OK........

Let's see ,it's dark 6 months and light 6 months 24/7 ! I might want to kill myself or go a little crazy too! JMHO

[SOS]

4. And Wasilla is the crystal meth capital of Alaska

http://www.juneauempire.com/stories/030805/sta_20050308002.shtml

Good work Mayor!

[tularetom]

5. Well ya know it's the last frontier

It's where people go who have fucked up everywhere else, it's the last chance for all kinds of societal misfits and losers, it's a place where you can escape your past, your actions and your responsibilities.

So it should come as no surprise that a large number of these loners, criminals, and misfits wind up doing anti social acts. Alaska may provide them with a last chance but being in Alaska won't change their personalities. If they were druggies, rapists or drunks where they were before they're still going to be druggies rapists and alcoholics.

For whatever reason the dregs of society have been encouraged to move there. What you're seeing in those statistics is the outcome of the encouragement.