BACKGROUND:
Health and demographic surveillance systems have been established through the International Network for Demographic Evaluation of Populations and Their Health network in 13 African countries to collect data on socio-economic and demographic characteristics of a population(1,2). Since then, data enclaves have been created across Africa. Some sites employ the use of the WHO verbal autopsy instrument when collecting data on deaths(3). The aim of this research was to assess the quality and effectiveness of verbal autopsies in reporting pesticide suicides in South African sites.

METHODS:
All three HDSS sites in South Africa were contacted through the South African Population Research Infrastructure Network and a formal data request sent. The data collected was categorized under identification codes related to suicide or poisoning with no specific period allocated. Researchers reviewed the data and recorded the number of deaths in each category.

RESULTS:
The three South African sites spanned two provinces covering a total population of 336 000. A total of 305 cases were extracted from the requested codes. Eight were identified as pesticide suicides, with all identified at one of the sites. The incidence rate for this site was 0.26 cases per 100,000 per year. Pesticide suicide incidence rates could not be determined at the other sites due to a lack of data.

CONCLUSIONS:
While some data in the data enclaves was obtained around suicide, poisoning deaths and pesticide suicides, not enough was present to draw inference into the prevalence of pesticide suicide in South Africa. Low pesticide suicide incidence rates were seen across the sites, which, although it does not echo the African or global trend, it does align with previous findings in South Africa. Pesticide suicide surveillance in South Africa would benefit from more surveillance sites being established and better harmonisation of data collection at these sites.