Calls are up to a national suicide prevention hot line, and a local hot line in the expensive resort area of Blaine County says calls are at an all-time high.

Idaho, along with other Intermountain states, long has had one of the highest suicide rates in the nation, and Blaine County often is at the top of Idaho's rankings.

Preliminary state data for 2008 show 248 suicides statewide, up 12.7 percent from 220 a year earlier. It is the biggest annual increase since at least 2001.

Suicide is the second leading cause of death, right after accidents, for Idahoans ages 15 to 44.

Blaine County's call increase "is directly related to the economic situation," said Sher Foster, executive director of The Crisis Hotline at (208) 788-3596 in Blaine County. "We have people calling who are professionals, and they have no work.

"It's a tough place to live, because it is expensive here. Many people work two or three jobs just to live here."

Idaho is one of just two states that doesn't have its own nationally accredited hot line with a statewide reach. The other is Vermont.

Idaho calls go to the national suicide hot line, (800) 273-TALK (8255), the number you often find in the first few pages of phone books or at the top of Web sites. Idaho calls are routed to Portland, where the staff tries to stay up to date on services available 400 miles away.

In the first three months of 2009, the Portland hot line fielded 810 calls from Idaho, up from 479 in the same period of 2008 and up from 676 the last quarter of 2008.

"We have been working with people at the state level for a while to let them know there is a significant concern that no 24-7 crisis hot line service is available in Idaho for people who may be suicidal," said John Draper, director of the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, a network of more than 130 crisis centers nationwide.

Vermont is working to set up a hot line, according to national hot line officials, but Idaho's home-grown effort is on hold for lack of money. The federal government can pay the phone bills, but states pay to staff and operate them.

The Blaine County hot line is private and nonprofit and funded mainly through donations. It doesn't have an office that can be staffed 24-7, one of the requirements for national accreditation. Seventeen volunteers take turns answering calls around the clock on a cell phone, even taking it to bed.

Foster had no exact numbers on the increase in calls to the Blaine County hot line but said it gets 24 to 25 calls a month from as far away as Ada County.

Job loss can set off a downward spiral that can lead to hopelessness, experts say.

"People lose their jobs, and they don't have mental-health insurance coverage," said Ann Kirkwood, director of youth suicide prevention at the Institute of Rural Health on the Idaho State University campus in Boise. "You can see the risk factors there."

Kirkwood is helping with Idaho's effort to start a statewide hot line. The state had a line until three years ago, when it was discontinued because of difficulty finding people to serve consistently on a board of directors, said Peter Wollheim, co-chairman of the Idaho Council on Suicide Prevention.

For now, the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare has crisis lines with services that vary by region and often include help for abused children or victims of domestic violence.

Hot lines nationwide get their highest call volumes in late spring and early summer, Wollheim said.

While the economy is one of many reasons, others include transitions for seasonal agricultural workers and students, and perhaps a seasonal increase in drug and alcohol use, Wollheim said

No statistics specifically link the recession with suicidal thinking, but about one in four callers nationwide talk about economic trouble, Draper said.

Layoffs hurt even if the laid-off workers have no other risk factors for suicide.

People with higher-paying jobs and advanced degrees may have the hardest time dealing with job loss, Wollheim said. "When people feel they are going down in the world, that impacts people's sense of themselves."

Colleen LaMay: 377-6448