Collateral Damage

2 Afghan Sisters, Swept Up in a Suicide Wave 

The sisters’ deaths shattered their family and have struck a chilling chord for the residents of Mazar-i-Sharif, a city increasingly marked by the despair of its young women. For many, the deaths have come to symbolize a larger crisis: an intensifying wave of suicide attempts.Although the government says it does not collect data on these cases, the city’s main hospital says it has been overwhelmed, with three or four such patients coming in every day, up from about one or two a month a decade ago.

The number of attempts has grown with such speed that the head of investigations for the police, Col. Salahudin Sultan, says he can no longer follow up on them.

“We don’t have the time or resources to investigate these,” he explained. “We would hardly get anything else done.”

My guess-  low fat dieting has been imported to the urban areas.  Those girls are learning western nutrition in their schools now.