“Decrease in suicide rates after a change of policy reducing access to firearms in adolescents: A naturalistic epidemiological study.”

In this article “Decrease in suicide rates after a change of policy reducing access to firearms in adolescents: A naturalistic epidemiological study”.By: Gad Lubin, Nomi Werbeloff, Demian Halperin, Mordechai Shmushkevitch, Mark Weiser. They talk about how Suicide is the third most common cause of death among children and young adolescents from the ages 10 to 24 years of age in the United states. They said the percentage of suicides caused by firearms in Europe was 38% while in the United States it’s a drastic jump from 60-70%. This article talks about how young men that have the availability to firearms are more likely to commit suicide and has been shown in the suicide rates. This study looked at the Israeli Defense Force (IDF), which is an army, based population that is mandatory for ages, 18-21 adolescents to enlist in. They found that 90% of the suicides in the IDF were committed by using of firearms, In 2003-2005 there were reported 28 suicides and 26.3 of them were with firearms. The suicides were usually when the soldiers when home on the weekends for leave and took their weapons. The IDF started to realize this and made a change in 2006 by making the soldiers leave their guns when they went on leave. Their results of this study were that by making a policy change in the guns that they were able to decrease the rate of suicide with the use of firearms by 40%. They did not find an increase in suicide by other means; they think that the use of firearms was an impulsive attempt whereas if they had to time to plan it out they wouldn’t do i.

After reading this article I think it was really cool and very interesting that they were able to look at this whole leaving the guns on base a way of stopping the suicide by a great amount. I sit and think about suicide and how people can be so selfish sometimes and like the saying is suicide is a permanent solution for a temporary problem. If you think about it the use of firearms is a rash and impulsive way of committing suicide and if there were no access to firearms there would be less deaths in the world as a whole. Suicide is a sad thing to think about and the fact that they came up with a tiny way to stop it and reduce the rates is a wonderful thing.

http://0-search.proquest.com.books.redlands.edu/sociology/docview/848856112/D7BF95840C954693PQ/21?accountid=14729

One thought on ““Decrease in suicide rates after a change of policy reducing access to firearms in adolescents: A naturalistic epidemiological study.”

  1. Suicide is a horrible thing and we need to do more to help people suffering from depression. The loneliness and despair in those periods is a difficult state to get through.

    The study of Israeli soldiers and its conclusion, however, has proven inadequate given recent figures since the policy changed. 28 soldiers committed suicide in 2010 alone and 14 have done so in each of the past two years, a rate similar to 2003-2005. The decrease was probably a coincidence and unrelated to the change in policy.

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