The suicide rate of female Australian Defence Force veterans is more than twice as high as women of their age in the general population.
A report from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare released on Friday, which is the first to include suicide information for ex-serving women, found that between 2001 and 2017, 21 women who had been in the armed forces during that period took their own lives.
Among serving men in the defence force, the report found suicide rates were about 50 per cent lower than in the general population but ex-serving men, which does not include those in the reserves, had an 18 per cent higher suicide rate and ex-serving women had a 115 per cent higher rate.
Professor Megan Mackenzie, from the University of Sydney, said women in the United States armed forces also struggled with elevated suicide rates.
She said women who had served in the armed forces faced the risk of sexual assault and were sometimes made to feel invisible when they returned to civilian life.
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