Suicide is one of the main causes of premature mortality in Russia. There is strong evidence of a crucial role of harmful drinking pattern (binge drinking) in explanation a high suicide rate in this country.

This paper was design to estimate the aggregate level effect of binge drinking on suicide mortality rate in Russia.

Trends in age-adjusted, sex-specific suicide mortality and fatal alcohol poisoning rate (as a proxy for binge drinking) from 1980 to 2005 were analyzed employing a distributed lags analysis in order to asses bivariate relationship between the two time series.

The results of the time series analysis indicate the presence of a statistically significant association between the two time series at zero lag for male (R = 0.44; P <0.001), and for female (R = 0.13; P <0.001). The estimated effects of binge drinking on the age-specific suicide mortality rates for men were positive for all age groups ranging from 0.33 (60-74 age group) to 0.55 (30-44 age group). The estimated effects of binge drinking on the age-specific suicide mortality rates for women were positive for age groups 15-29 (0.54); 30-44 (0.22) and 45-59 (0.13).

This study indicates that substantial proportion of suicide deaths in Russia is due to acute effect of binge drinking. The findings from the present study also suggest that a restrictive alcohol policy can be considered as an effective measure of suicide prevention in countries where higher rate of alcohol consumption and binge drinking pattern.