The New York Times
If
it takes a sensational statistic to spur national concern about such
self-destruction, consider the latest research showing that 82 percent
of teenage suicides by firearms involve guns left poorly secured or
foolishly unprotected by members of their families. These young lives
are impulsively lost in supposedly safe home environments, where just
the presence of a gun has been found to increase the risk of suicide
three times, according to a new report by the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, a gun safety organization.
The
report also notes that 85 percent of people attempting suicide by gun
succeed, while drug overdose, the main method chosen for suicide
attempts, is fatal only 2 percent of the time. Ninety percent of those
who fail in a suicide attempt embrace their second chance at life and do
not eventually die by suicide.
There
is stark evidence that easy access to guns compounds the crisis. The
states with the five highest rates of gun suicides have gun ownership
rates notably higher than the national average, according to the Brady
study. Meanwhile, the gun lobby and firearm industry are engaged in a
reckless campaign to have more Americans own and carry guns.
Debate Magazine
