Study: Gun Owners More Likely to Be Killed by Guns

NYT via Join Together Online ^ | May 27, 2003 | ERIC NAGOURNEY

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

A University of California at Los Angeles study shows that gun owners are nearly twice as likely to be killed by guns than those who do not keep firearms at home, the New York Times reported May 27.

The study further found that people with guns at home are 16 times more likely to commit suicide using guns.

More than half of victims knew their assailants, and 15 percent of killings arose from family arguments.

The lethality of guns played a role in the carnage, experts said. "People who are shot are substantially more likely to die than people injured with non-gun weapons," said study author Dr. Douglas J. Wiebe, who is now with the University of Pennsylvania.

For the research, Wiebe analyzed the deaths of 1,720 homicide victims and 1,959 suicide victims and a sampling of American adults.

The study is published in the June 2003 edition of the Annals of Emergency Medicine.

[FreedomCalls]

People who own gas ovens are more likely to commit suicide by putting their head in a gas oven that are people who own electric ovens.

[Redcloak]

Kellermann redux?

[FreedomCalls]

More than half of victims knew their assailants, and 15 percent of killings arose from family arguments.

Did Cain kill Abel with a .45 or a .357?

[FreedomCalls]

The lethality of guns played a role in the carnage, experts said. "People who are shot are substantially more likely to die than people injured with non-gun weapons,"

I guess the lesson I should take from that statement is: "When confronted with a bad guy who is pointing a gun at you -- SHOOT FIRST! If he shoots first, you may not live to shoot back."

I wonder if that was the intended lesson?

[2nd_Amendment_Defender]

Wow, this is a scary thought with 70 million firearm owners in the United States. We need to do this for the children. I'm going to get rid of all my guns tomorrow! (gag)

This information must have been fabricated by the below person:

[sailor4321]

It is "worthwhile" to go to the web site and read the "study". What the synopsis and news release don't say is that over half of the "case subjects" were black (vs 26% of the control subjects). Thus, the study is heavily skewed by a disproportionate representation of the most dangerous group in the world for gun homicides: black American males. Naturally, the exact "causality" between guns and homicides is not identified; merely a statistical "association' between gun possession and homicide. The relationship may be completely coincidental, scientifically speaking, with homicides being "caused" by some other completely unidentified factor (dangerous neighbors, perhaps?).

In summary, this study is a piece of crap and if your Doctor cites it in some lecture about the dangers of guns you would be well advised to seek out a different, professional Doctor....

[TheDon]

Good point. No doubt this study includes armed criminals killed by the police!

[sailor4321]

Oh, God, I've killed another thread...

[Blood of Tyrants]

Scary. At night you are at your weakest. Try an aluminum collander with a chin strap :^)

[lepton]

The study further found that people with guns at home are 16 times more likely to commit suicide using guns.

But no more likely to commit suicide. Repeated studies have shown that only among the elderly does a ban on guns change the likelihood that those committing suicide will choose a firearm, and that these elderly will commit suicide at the same rate, just merely using other tools.

[sailor4321]

Given a choice between my electric oven and a gun, I'll use the gun every time....

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Canada demonstrated this. When they cracked down on gun ownership, the suicide rate did not go down. People just started jumping off bridges and buildings a lot more.

[El Gato]

More than half of victims knew their assailants, and 15 percent of killings arose from family arguments.

Meaning that 85 percent were not family members. Most gang members "know" people in other gangs, and frequently people not in gangs "know" gang members who assault, rape and murder them. Just because you "know" someone, or they are a "family member" (think abusive spouse), doesnt' mean you might not need to defend yourself against them. I'm sure that the "study" makes no distinction between those killed in self defense and murders, no distinction between gang members killed by rivial gang members and law abiding citzens killed by gang members, robbers and rapists. Not to mention the gang members, robbers and rapists shot by their would be victims.

People who own guns are more likely to be killed by people with guns, after all what motivates many people to have a gun is that they live in a "bad" neighborhood, or have some really bad acquantences. The key is that many people, many more people who buy guns for those reasons use them in self defense, even if that means merely threatening to shoot an attacker, robber or rapist, rather than actually fireing the gun.

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Yep, we all knew this study is a load of crap and we know who's driving it (DNC with media support). Why don't we see a new grassroots effort every time a nutjob hacks a bunch of his co-workers with a machete or some guy cuts off his fingers with a bandsaw?

[El Gato]

Without even looking at the actual study I can tell you that it is not scientific - nor is it credible.

Not that it matters to the gun grabbers.

I have skimmed the study and it does not make a distinction between justifiable homicide and criminal homicide, by their own admission. That alone throws it's conclusions into a cocked hat. They attempted (a fig leaf really) to argue against the "bad neighbordhood" thesis by noting that possesion of a gun (by the "victim") is not correleated to homicide by other means. (i.e. if people had the gun because they lived in bad neighborhood, they'd be more likely to be killed by other methods as well as with guns.) It does separate out suicide from other "gun deaths", but it's well known that deprived of a gun, those wishing to commit suicide will find another way. Nearly gunless Japan, for example, has a much higher suicide rate than the US.

[Publius6961]

Yeah. One of them wrote a book about how there were very few firearms during the colonial period in early America.

It sank from view like a stone.
Crummy scholarship is crummy scholarship.

[El Gato]

"Who funded it?"

Here's a start, but you'll have to trace back to see who funded them.

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This work was supported at the University of California–Los
Angeles in part by a grant from The California Wellness Foundation (TCWF). Partial funding was provided also by Public Health Foundation Enterprises, Inc., through a grant from The California Endowment. The original dissertation research was funded in part by a grant from the School of Social Ecology at the University of California–Irvine.

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Notice that they guy got his PhD pumping out this kind of nonsense, apparently funded by the taxpayers of California, although grants to the School of Social Ecology although some unamed grant to the student/author is not impossible either.

Here's a few things that the Wellness Foundation has also funded.. sweet huh? Especially when you find out where their money comes from.. see below...

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CENTER FOR INVESTIGATIVE REPORTING, INC.
San Francisco, CA
Grant Amount: $200,000.00
Q2 (April - June), 1995
To develop, produce, and distribute a nationally televised news documentary on firearms and the firearms industry to help create general public awareness about the systemic forces that perpetuate violence in America.


LEGAL COMMUNITY AGAINST VIOLENCE
San Francisco, CA
Grant Amount: $40,000.00
Q4 (October - December), 1995
To support the Local Ordinance Project for educating government officals throughout the state about effective local ordinances that will help reduce firearm-related injuries and violence.


Legal Community Against Violence
San Francisco, CA
Grant Amount: $40,000.00
Q1 (January - March), 1997
To support the Local Ordinance Project, which provides legal assistance to local governments to pass legally defensible firearms measures.


STATE OF CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH SERVICES
Sacramento, CA
Grant Amount: $310,000.00
Q4 (October - December), 1999
To support the California Firearms Injury Surveillance Program to analyze firearm and violent injury data and disseminate results to policymakers, public health professionals and community advocates throughout the state.


STATE OF CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH SERVICES
Sacramento, CA
Grant Amount: $700,000.00
Q3 (July - September), 1994
To support the establishment of a California Firearms Injury Surveillance Program to analyze statewide gunshot injury data and disseminate results to public health professionals, community advocates, and policymakers throughout the state.


STATE OF CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH SERVICES
Sacramento, CA
Grant Amount: $700,000.00
Q4 (October - December), 1994
To support the establishment of a California Firearms Injury Surveillance Program to analyze statewide gunshot injury data and disseminate results to public health professionals, community advocates, and policymakers throughout the state.


UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, DAVIS (UCD)
Davis, CA
Grant Amount: $154,000.00
Q4 (October - December), 1995
To augment (see#94-17) the Violence Prevention Research Program to broaden the research emphasis to better serve policymakers and the public, and to help formulate and enact effective firearm violence prevention strategies.


UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, DAVIS (UCD)
Davis, CA
Grant Amount: $150,000.00
Q1 (January - March), 1997
To support a comprehensive study on firearm policy and prevention.


UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, DAVIS (UCD)
Davis, CA
Grant Amount: $450,000.00
Q3 (July - September), 1993
To provide data necessary to formulate and enact effective firearm violence prevention strategies by conducting descriptive and analytic studies.

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Where does the money come from? From anyone who buys health insurance from the for profit Heatlh Net and the associated QualMed.
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"TCWF was created in 1992 as a result of Health Net’s conversion from nonprofit to for-profit status. Under the terms of the 1992 California Department of Corporations’ conversion order approving Health Net’s change to for-profit status, the Foundation received the equivalent of the Department’s valuation of Health Net at that time, which was $300 million, plus 80 percent of the equity of the holding company formed as Health Net’s parent. Later, other mergers involving Health Net’s parent and QualMed increased TCWF’s assets dramatically. The Foundation currently has assets of approximately $1 billion. The Foundation operates independently of Health Net."

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But does Health Net operate independently of the Foundation?


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( http://www.healthnet.com/ ) Health Net is: "Health Net, Inc. (NYSE:HNT) is one of the nation's largest publicly traded managed health care companies." That includes members of the US military under the Tricare program ( http://www.healthnetfederalservices.com/ )

(hold one while I check my blood pressure, wouldn't want to blow a gasket before I get all this info posted.. :) )

Foundation Health Systems, Inc is the parent company reffered to above

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QualMed Plans for Health, formerly Greater Atlantic Health Service, is a managed care company that provides HMO and point-of-service coverage. QualMed is a wholly owned subsidiary of Foundation Health Systems, Inc., one of the largest publicly traded HMOs in the United States with more that 5 million satisfied members nationwide.

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Thus five million people are helping to pay for this slop, most of them quite unknowingly I'm sure.

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from ( http://www.phfe.org/index.html)

PHFE Management Solutions, also known as Public Health Foundation Enterprises, is a 34 year old 501(c)3 nonprofit organization providing back office support and management services to public health and nonprofit programs. From gang intervention, WIC and teen pregnancy prevention to immunization programs, PHFE partners with organizations nationwide as their fiscal agent and sponsor to help them make a difference.

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But I can't figure out where they get their money. They appear to be non-profit services organization, providing services to other non-profits, but obviously they spread a little money around too. Someone else can figure out where they get their money. They can function as direct funnel of money to other non-profits, perhaps allowing for the rabib anti-gunner to "launder" their contributions to studies like this.

[Dan from Michigan]

Like my tagline says, It's the same ole song and dance.

[white trash redneck]

Sounds like the same old recycled bullshit.