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Source: https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/special-reports/2023/10/26/rural-areas-suicides-play-big-role-in-wisconsins-rising-gun-deaths/70974942007/
Suicide is the vast majority of Gun Violence
Suicide is the vast majority of Gun Violence
Intentional self-inflicted gunshot wounds (gun suicide attempts) account for more than 70% of the gun deaths in Wisconsin (604 lives) and 69% of gun deaths in Minnesota (513 lives). This is much higher than the 54% national average in 2021. Homicides accounted for less than half that, or 25% (153 lives).
About half of all suicide deaths in the United States (26,000 out of 48,000 total deaths) were deaths by firearm. Self-harm attempts are much more likely to result in death when a firearm is involved (admittedly a difficult statistic to measure), much more than suffocation, the second leading cause of self-harm fatalities, (~25%) or poisoning (about 20% of self-harm deaths).
Surviving Suicide Attempts
Surviving Suicide Attempts
In nine out of ten cases, a person who has attempted suicide and survived will not die by suicide at a later date. In other words, if someone survives one suicide attempt, they will NOT go on to take their own life later.
85% of gun suicide attempts are fatal, compared to around 5-10% for other forms of suicide. That means very few of those attempts will result in a survival and recovery. In many cases, self-harm happens as a split-second decision, and with access to a firearm that decision usually results in death.
Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health has done a series of case studies and investigations showing that access to a gun is the most important factor in determining whether someone will succeed in ending their life when they are in crisis.
https://hsph.harvard.edu/news/guns-suicide/
State Gun Policy Makes a Difference
State Gun Policy Makes a Difference
In states with better gun laws (not necessarily more restrictive), suicide by firearms drops drastically (cut by more than 50% compared to other states).
Firearms are the most lethal method of suicide attempts, and about half of suicide attempts take place within 10 minutes of the current suicide thought, so having immediate access to firearms is a major risk factor. The availability of firearms has been linked to suicides in a number of peer-reviewed studies. In one such study, researchers examined the association between firearm availability and suicide while also accounting for the potential confounding influence of state-level suicidal behaviors (as measured by suicide attempts). Researchers found that higher rates of gun ownership were associated with increased suicide by firearm deaths, but not with other types of suicide.
Mental Health and Gun Suicides
Mental Health and Gun Suicides
If quick and easy access to personal firearms are required for home defense and personal safety, how could we possibly solve the issue of access without curtailing gun-owners' rights and personal protections? What if there were a way to do both?
The answer is to give them temporary storage options for when they're feeling unsafe or at risk of hurting themselves. It's up for debate whether law-enforcement should be involved (there are a number of complications to that), but there are other options. One in particular is the Gun Shop Project (see Wisconsin's page at Safer Communities Wisconsin for more information) which gives gun-owners more options for temporary safe storage, makes sure gun shops are protected from liability and facilitates fully-legal temporary transfers. More and more local gun shops and sporting goods stores are offering this as an option.
A broader discussion of safe storage options is available here, under Secure Storage.
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