DID YOU KNOW? States with high household gun ownership have more unintentional shooting deaths than states with low household gun ownership.

• The mortality rate from accidental shootings is 8 times higher in the four states with the most guns compared to the four states with the fewest guns (Miller, 2001, p. 481).
• For kids ages 5 to 14, the mortality rate is 14 times higher in high gun states than low gun states (Miller, 2001, p. 481).
• For kids ages 0 to 4, the mortality rate is 17 times higher in high gun states than low gun states (Miller, 2001, p. 481).
• For every age group, where there are more guns there are more accidental deaths (Miller, 2001, p.483).
• Every year, 642 people die from an unintentional shooting. To see a breakdown of unintentional firearm deaths by age, click here.
• Every year, 15,698 people are wounded in an unintentional shooting but survive (National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC). To see a breakdown of unintentional injuries by age, click here.

DID YOU KNOW? A third of homes contain guns, many of them readily accessible.

• Thirty-three percent of U.S. households contain a gun (Pew, 2009), and half of gun-owning households don't lock up their guns, including 40 percent of households with kids under age 18 (Johnson, p. 175).
  
• Both firearm prevalence and questionable storage practices (i.e. storing firearms loaded and unlocked) are associated with higher rates of unintentional firearm deaths (Miller, 2005, p. 665).
• A gun in the home is 4 times more likely to be used in an unintentional shooting than to be used to injure or kill in self-defense (Kellermann, p. 263).

DID YOU KNOW? Unintentional shootings are a problem among children, teens, and young adults.

• The unintentional firearm-related death rate for children 0-14 years old is NINE times higher in the U.S. than in the 25 other countries combined (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, p. 101).
• In one year, 54 children ages 0-14 are killed in an unintentional shooting and an additional 802 are treated in emergency room for an unintentional gunshot wound (NCIPC).  
• In one year, 193 teenagers and young adults (ages 15-24) are shot and killed unintentionally and an additional 7,500 are treated in an emergency room for an unintentional gunshot wound (NCIPC).

SOLUTION: We make it too easy for dangerous people to obtain dangerous weapons.  There are only a few gun control laws on the books, and even those have loopholes.  We should make it harder for convicted felons, the dangerously mentally ill, and youth to get the guns in the first place. We can do this by passing effective laws that make sense. 

Sources

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "Rates of Homicide, Suicide and Firearm-related Death Among Children – 26 Industrialized Countries." Morbidity Mortality Weekly Report, 46(5)(02/07/97):101-105

Johnson, Renee, Tamera Coyne-Beasley, Carol Runyan, "Firearm Ownership and Storage Practices, U.S. Households, 1992–2002: A Systematic Review," American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 27:2 (2007): 173-182

Kellermann, A. L., "Injuries and Deaths due to Firearms in the Home," Journal of Trauma, 45:2 (1998):263-67

Miller, Matthew; Deborah Azrael, David Hemenway, Mary Vriniotis, "Firearm Storage Practices and Rates of Unintentional Firearm Deaths in the United States," Accident Analysis and Prevention, 37 (2005):661-67

Miller, Matthew; Deborah Azrael, David Hemenway, "Firearm Availability and Unintentional Firearm Deaths." Accident Analysis and Prevention, 33(2001): 477-84

National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (2006 (deaths) and 2007 (injuries), most recent year available), www.cdc.gov/ncipc/wisqars/.  Calculations by Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, 2009.

Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, 2009 Values Survey, Final Topline, Question e.F2, April 2009, accessed 6/29/2009 at http://people-press.org/reports/questionnaires/513.pd.  The number of guns in the home is estimated via telephone survey research.  The U. S. does not register guns, so it is not possible to count them.