Posted on 03/01/2002 2:51:45 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
BOSTON (Reuters) - Children are much more likely to be murdered, commit suicide or die accidentally because of guns in states and regions with higher levels of household firearm ownership, according to a new study by Harvard researchers.
The study, published in The Journal of Trauma, is significant because it shows that the mere presence of firearms leads to more violent death among children aged 5-14, said Dr. Matthew Miller, the lead author.
"When most people buy a gun, they do so with the presumption that guns make them safer," Miller said in an interview. "Our results suggest strongly that this presumption is not warranted and that the children that parents seek to protect with guns are instead being killed by guns."
While other studies have shown links between teen suicide and guns, this is the first national study to examine the connection between firearm ownership and violent death among younger children, said Miller, associate director of Harvard's Injury Control Research Center.
The study looked at data from all 50 states from 1988 to 1997. In that period, 6,817 children between 5 and 14 years old died from firearms: 3,447 from homicides, 1,782 from accidental shootings and 1,588 from suicide.
The study showed that the five states with the highest gun ownership levels had many more firearm-related deaths among children than the five states with the lowest levels of gun ownership.
The two groups of states had almost the same number of children, but in the high gun-ownership states there were 253 accidental firearm deaths compared to just 15 in the low gun-ownership states.
There were 153 firearm suicides in the high gun-ownership states compared to 22 in the low-ownership states and there were 298 firearm murders in the high gun-ownership states compared to 86 in the low-ownership states.
Meanwhile, the rates of non firearm-related suicides and murders in the two groups of states were much closer, leading Miller to conclude the increase in deaths was attributable to the higher number of firearm-related deaths.
"The large difference in gun-related deaths compared with the low level of difference in non-firearm deaths allows us to say that guns are playing some role," Miller said.
The difference remains even when the data is controlled for poverty, education and urbanization, the study found.
"Although no conclusions about cause and effect can be made, this study provides compelling evidence that states with high firearm availability are states with high childhood firearm death rates," Dr. Therese Richmond of the University of Pennsylvania's Firearm Injury Center wrote in an editorial.
The five states with the highest rates of gun ownership are Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas and West Virginia. The five with the lowest are Hawaii, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey and Delaware.
One more day of hearing the truth.
Good point! And don't these studies include as children in their numbers, ages up to 23?
Second, I wonder how a Harvard Health Study would be accepted, if it looked at the deaths caused by vaccines and ignored the lives saved by vaccinations? We also know from John Lott's study and other studies that gun ownership reduces the number of murders, assaults, rapes and robberies and especially those public run amok killers. How many lives does widespread gun ownership save?
Third, if simple gun ownership kills kids, shouldn't the police and the military be disarmed too? If not, isn't that putting other priorities above the lives of kids? Just wondering.
The study implies that keeping a gun for home protection is a bad move but it does not state that these "accidental shootings" happened in a home setting. Its very possible the majority happen during deer season.
Oh, don't give them the green light!
I find it most interesting that they chose to limit the children's ages. In most "guns kill children" studies, the "children's" ages range up to 19. I imagine this "significant" difference in child mortality disappears quite rapidly around 16. ;)
Given control of a dataset, you can prove anything. Statistics is so much fun!
You are exactly right. There have been so many of these bogus "studies" made by radical anti-gun "scholars" that the pro-gun truth squads are kept busy debunking them. Even impartial independent research has shown them to be bogus, but seemingly to no avail because they are still given credence by the media and the leftist pols. The famous study made in Washington state a few years ago and which was ballyhooed on every 6 o'clock news show for years was quickly shown to be a total fraud by several different debunkers, yet we still hear the "statistic" that a gun in the home is 48 times (or some such ridiculous number) more likely to kill a household member than a criminal intruder. Even though the original "study" has been completely discredited by non-partisan research as well as by pro-gun research, the fraudulent figures are still regularly quoted as gospel truth by the media whores at every opportunity.
Then there is the bogus "study" statistic of thirty-something "children" killed by guns every day in America. We have shown over and over that that statistic counts young people up to 24 years old as children, which takes in virtually all of the gang-banger, drug dealer, stick-up artist population. If only actual, honest-to-Pete children are counted, the number of firearms related child deaths is drastically reduced into the same general statistical realm as drownings in 5 gallon buckets. Yet again, even though this child-death fraud has been thoroughly and repeatedly debunked, the media keeps on endlessy quoting the bogus statistic. Once this kind of traudulent "study" gets out into the media it will live on forever, even though a stake has been driven squarely through it's heart by real, honest research.
As you said, the anti-gun people are shameless liars who will lie, steal, cheat, and do or say anything to advance their cause of disarming the American people. It makes you wonder why one particular sector of the political spectrum is so relentlessly determined to establish a total government monopoly on weapons possession.
The study says that it considered factors such as education and income, both of which would be related to your factors of "enlightenment" and "intervention" via drugs or other efforts. The factors were not sufficient to explain the gross difference in gun deaths among children.
The study looked at data from all 50 states from 1988 to 1997. In that period, 6,817 children between 5 and 14 years old died from firearms: 3,447 from homicides, 1,782 from accidental shootings and 1,588 from suicide.
|
Accidental Death Rates for Children (ages 0-14) |
|
|
Cause |
Number |
| Motor Vehicle | 3,059 |
| Drowning | 1,060 |
| Fires, burns | 833 |
| Mechanical Suffocation | 459 |
| Ingestion of Food or Object | 213 |
| Firearms | 181 |
| Figures are for 1995. National Safety Council, Accident Facts: 1998 Edition, at 10, 11, 18. | |
In 1997, the total number of children, ages 0-14 killed by firearms (all causes) was 629 or 1.7 per day.
National Center for Health Statistics, 1997
Accidental gun deaths among children have declined by over 50 % in 25 years, even though the population (and the gun stock) has continued to increase.
Kopel, Guns: Who Should Have Them?, at 311 and National Safety Council, Accident Facts: 1998 Edition, at 18.
Children 14 and under are over 21 times more likely to die in an automobile, and nearly 8 times more likely to drown than die in an accident with a gun.
Data compiled from National Health Safety Council, Injury Facts, 1999
Courtesy of gunfacts.org
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