Suicide guns: why collect this information?

Suicide guns: why collect this information? Firearm suicide is a worldwide problem. The majority of firearm deaths in many countries are suicides (including and the United States). 1 2 In the United States, over half of suicides are committed with firearms. 1 2 However, we know much more about the characteristics of suicide victims than we do about the firearms that they use. Although often overlooked, the collection of information on the characteristics of firearms involved in suicide can be very useful for research and for the development and evaluation of prevention programs and policies. 3 4 We believe it is important to improve collection of suicide firearm information, as part of the collection of firearm information for all firearm injuries, for the following reasons. First, information on the manufacturers and models of guns used most frequently in suicide can be used to evaluate intervention programs. For example, we used such information to evaluate the extent to which the types of guns used to commit suicide are recovered in gun buyback programs in Wisconsin. Our analysis showed that firearms recovered in buyback programs are not the ones most likely to be used in suicides. 4 This information provides important feedback for the buyback programs to focus on the guns most often associated with suicide. Secondly, information on physical firearm characteristics (including serial number) is needed in order for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) to trace when, where, and by whom the firearm was originally purchased. Firearms used in homicide are increasingly being traced; however those used in suicide are not routinely traced. A great deal of useful information can be obtained from tracing suicide firearms and linking the trace results with the fatal event. This includes: x Whether the first purchaser was the suicide victim or another person at the same address. x The proximity of the location of first purchase to the location of the suicide. x The time interval between the first purchase of the firearm and the fatal event. In regard to this time interval, several studies have indicated that the period immediately after the firearm purchase is particularly high risk for suicide. A study using information from handgun purchase applications found that the rate of firearm suicide in the first week after the purchase of a handgun was 57 times as high as the rate in the general population. 3 A study based …