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Abstract
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Health agencies and professionals must recognize firearm injuries and deaths as a major health hazard and give proper priority and resources to addressing the problem.
VioLit summary:
OBJECTIVE:
The purpose of this article by Baker et al. was to assemble broad references to support a thesis that firearms control and regulation were either lacking or poorly implemented. This article was a non-experimental explanation describing how the widespread ownership and use of firearms in American society had a negative impact on public health.
METHODOLOGY:
The authors followed a nonexperimental review of the literature.
FINDINGS/DISCUSSION:
Firearms in the United States were reported as second only to motor vehicles in the number of fatal injuries they inflicted. In 1977, firearms were responsible for 32,000 deaths in this country. They were used in two-thirds of all homicides and also provided the most common vehicle of committing suicide in the United States. Specifically, the authors note that firearms were used in more than half of all suicides. The estimated number of nonfatal injuries caused by firearms ranged as high as 100,000 per year in the U.S. and handguns accounted for three-fourths of firearm related homicides.
The increasing availability of firearms was believed to be related to increasing incidence of firearm-related injuries. The Federal Gun Control act of 1968 brought a somewhat higher degree of regulation to firearm use and regulation than was previously available. The Federal Gun Control Act made it unlawful to sell a firearm to a person less than 18 years of age or who had been convicted of certain crimes, was a fugitive from justice, unlawfully used controlled substances, or had been adjudicated as a mental defective. Manufacturers and importers of guns were required by the Federal Gun Control Act to be federally licensed and the law mandated keeping records of gun manufacture data as well as specifying a prohibition on the import of nonsporting categories of firearms.
AUTHORS' RECOMMENDATIONS:
The authors noted that present handgun design maximized the ability to cause serious or fatal injuries with a minimum of effort and planning. They believed the design of handguns should have been regulated to minimize the possibility of inadvertent discharge. Rather than regulation concentrated on the possession and use stages of a firearm's lifecycle more specific regulation of firearms at the manufacturing stage was recommended. This stage would include regulation of both quantities manufactured and product design, and would be more effective in reducing firearm injuries. Also, the authors noted a variety of countermeasures to gun injuries already existed, however they were not being utilized. Specifically, bullets less likely to wound had been developed for police use in crowd control but were not in general use by firearm owners. Finally, the authors recommended that health agencies and professionals recognize firearm deaths and injuries as a major health hazard and acknowledge that higher priorities and resources should be dedicated to addressing the situation.
(CSPV Abstract - Copyright © 1992-2007 by the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, Institute of Behavioral Science, Regents of the University of Colorado)
KW - Firearms Ownership
KW - Firearms Control
KW - Public Health Approach
KW - Public Policy
KW - Policy Recommendations
KW - Legislation
KW - Injury Prevention
KW - Firearms Injury
KW - Firearms Violence
KW - Firearms Homicide
KW - Violence Prevention
KW - Homicide Prevention
KW - Firearms Suicide
KW - Suicide Prevention
KW - Adult Firearms Use
KW - Adult Violence
KW - Juvenile Firearms Use
KW - Juvenile Violence |