In Argentina, a significant proportion of violent deaths are classified as being of undetermined intent (DUI). Hanging/strangulation/suffocation (HASU) accounted for 77% of suicides, while undetermined deaths (DUI) by HASU rose sharply during 2015–2023. This study aims to (1) identify spatial and spatiotemporal clusters of both mortality causes, (2) determine whether these clusters coincide geographically and (3) describe the overlap in their spatiotemporal distributions.
This is a retrospective quantitative study based on secondary data analysis. Spatial autocorrelation and space-time scan statistics techniques were used to detect spatial and spatiotemporal clusters of HASU-DUI and HASU-suicide in Argentina during 2015–2023.
Low-suicide-risk clusters were primarily observed in Buenos Aires, Córdoba and southern Santa Fe provinces. During 2020–2023, the Greater Buenos Aires cluster expanded westward across the province. Concurrently, HASU-DUI exhibited spatial diffusion within Buenos Aires Province, with this spread occurring predominantly in regions characterised by low HASU-suicide rates. The spatiotemporal analysis identified distinct geographic clustering of HASU deaths (both suicides and DUI) across Argentina (2015–2023). We observed inverse spatial patterns—low-risk suicide clusters and high-risk DUI clusters expanded—with overlapping areas showing declining suicides and rising DUIs post-2020.
Our spatiotemporal analysis offers tentative indications of possible recent reclassification patterns between DUI and suicides in Argentina. These findings offer tentative indications that combining undetermined deaths by HASU (Y20) with official suicide data may provide a more complete mortality picture in Argentina, though this interpretation requires further investigation.