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Which age groups in the US experienced the biggest suicide rate increases or decreases from 2019 to 2023?
Executive summary
National reporting shows overall U.S. suicide rates fell modestly from their 2018–2019 peak into 2019–2020 before rising back to roughly 2021–2023 levels; in 2023 the age‑adjusted suicide rate was about 14.1 per 100,000 and more than 49,000 people died by suicide [1] [2] [3]. Available sources do not provide a single, consistently formatted table showing the largest increases or decreases by every age group from 2019 to 2023; CDC and advocacy summaries describe only modest year‑to‑year changes across most age groups, with notable increases in some subgroups such as youth firearm suicides and large relative rises among certain racial‑sex groups [1] [4] [5].
1. What the federal data say about 2019 → 2023 overall trends
CDC‑compiled figures show suicide rates dipped from 2018 to 2019 and 2020, then rose again in 2021 and remained roughly at that higher level through 2023: the age‑adjusted rate was ~13.9 in 2019, ~13.5 in 2020, 14.1 in 2021, 14.2 in 2022 and about 14.1 in 2023 [1] [6]. The CDC’s public summaries emphasize that most age groups experienced only modest year‑to‑year changes between 2019 and 2023 rather than dramatic swings [6] [3].
2. Which age groups changed the most — what the sources explicitly mention
None of the provided sources contains a single clear ranking of absolute or percentage increases by each standard age bracket from 2019 to 2023; CDC reporting (MMWR/NCHS summaries) instead highlights that suicide rates “stayed roughly the same” across many age groups in 2023, with only slight increases or decreases reported for specific brackets [7] [3]. Suicide Prevention organizations’ summaries note modest decreases in some younger adult brackets from 2022→2023 (for example 15–24 and 25–34 vs. 2022), but these are comparisons to 2022 rather than a clean 2019→2023 delta [5].
3. Youth and firearm trends: where large relative changes are documented
Although overall age‑group changes appear modest, several sources call attention to sharp increases in firearm suicides for particular youth and female subgroups between 2019 and 2023: gun suicide rates among Black youth aged 10–19 rose dramatically (a multi‑year percent increase cited), and from 2019 to 2023 firearm suicide rates increased 65% among Black females and 25% among Hispanic females in the Johns Hopkins analysis of 2023 gun deaths [4]. These are method‑specific and subgroup‑specific spikes that can produce large percentage changes even if the absolute number of deaths in some age cells is smaller [4].
4. Older adults: high rates but smaller year‑to‑year swings
Multiple reports emphasize that the highest suicide rates in 2023 were concentrated among the oldest adults (e.g., ages 85+ reported highest rates ~22–22.7 per 100,000), but these age groups did not experience the largest year‑to‑year percentage increases in the cited summaries; rather, they remain high in absolute terms [2]. CDC materials note that suicide rates by age “stayed roughly the same” in 2023 with slight declines among some older brackets noted by advocacy pages [7] [5].
5. Limitations and what the sources do not say
Available sources do not present a single authoritative 2019→2023 table showing absolute and percentage change for every age group in a uniform way; much of the reporting mixes comparisons to 2022 or highlights method‑ and race/sex‑specific trends rather than a full age‑only breakdown from 2019 [5] [4] [7]. Where large percentage changes are reported (for example, gun suicide increases by race/sex), those reflect method‑specific or subgroup analyses and may not translate into the largest absolute changes by conventional age brackets [4].
6. How to interpret and use these findings
Interpretation requires distinguishing absolute rate changes (deaths per 100,000) from relative percent changes: older ages show the highest absolute rates in 2023, while some younger subgroups and specific race/sex groups show steep relative increases in firearm suicides [2] [4]. For policy or prevention focus, both perspectives matter: absolute burden is concentrated among older adults, while rapidly rising subgroups (e.g., Black youth firearm suicides, Black and Hispanic females by gun suicide) indicate where interventions or further investigation are urgently needed [4].
7. What to look for next and where to get more granular data
For a precise list of the “biggest increases/decreases” by each age bracket from 2019 to 2023, consult CDC’s finalized mortality tables and the NCHS data query system (the CDC/NCHS products and MMWR briefs are the primary sources cited in these summaries) because the available summaries here do not publish a clean 2019→2023 age‑by‑age delta [6] [8] [3]. If you want, I can extract and compare specific NCHS age‑group rates from those CDC tables and compute absolute and percent changes for each standard age group 2019→2023.