Effects of weather variables on suicide are well-documented, but there is still little consistency among the results of most studies. Nevertheless, most studies show a peak in suicides during the spring season, and this is often attributed to increased temperatures. The purpose of this study is to test the relationship between monthly temperature and monthly suicide, independent of months or seasons, for five counties located across the United States. Harmonic analysis shows that four of the five counties display some seasonal components in the suicide data. However, simple linear regression shows no correlation between suicide and temperature, and discriminant analysis shows that monthly departure from mean annual suicide rates is not a useful tool for identifying months with temperatures that are colder or warmer than the annual average. Therefore, it appears that the seasonality of suicides is due to factors other than temperature.

Increases in cannabis use among young people has heightened concern about the potential interactive health effects of cannabis with other drugs. We examined the longitudinal association between concurrent and simultaneous (SAM) co-use of alcohol and cannabis in young adulthood on mental health symptoms, substance use behaviors, and substance-related harms two years later. Data were drawn from Time 5 (T5; n = 464; 46% male) and 6 (T6; n = 478; 45% male) of the Victoria Healthy Youth Survey. At T5, 42% of participants used alcohol-only, 13% used concurrently, 41% used SAM, 1% were cannabis only users, and 3% abstained from cannabis and alcohol. Boys were more likely to use SAM. Higher T5 SAM use frequency was associated with heavier use of substances, more substance-related harms, and symptoms of psychosis and externalizing problems at T6. T5 Concurrent use was associated with conduct symptoms, illicit drug use, and alcohol use disorders at T6 relative to alcohol-only use. Cannabis is commonly used with alcohol and the findings suggest that any co-use (concurrent or simultaneous) may be problematic in young adulthood. Public health messages need to explicitly inform consumers about the possible consequences of using both alcohol and marijuana and the addictive pharmacological impact of using them together.