In addressing the shape of appropriate gun policy, this essay assumes for the sake of discussion that there is a legal and moral right to private gun ownership. My thesis is that, against the background of this right, the most defensible policy approach in the United States would feature moderate gun control. The first section summarizes the American gun control status quo and characterizes wha...

Mass public shootings are typically followed by a spike in gun sales as well as calls for stricter gun control laws. What remains unclear is whether the spike in gun sales is motivated by increased threat perceptions or by concerns about gun control, or whether the sales are mainly driven by non-owners purchasing guns or gun owners adding to their collection. Two surveys of gun owners and non-o...

One coastal village in Haenam-gun and two in Yeongam-gun, Jeollanam-do were surveyed for intestinal parasite infections by fecal examination. The egg positive rates of Gymnophalloides seoi were high, 24.1% (14/58) in Haenam-gun and 9.3% (11/118) in Yeongam-gun. The egg positive rates of heterophyids, including Heterophyes nocens, and of Clonorchis sinensis were 10.3% and 6.9% in Haenam-gun, and...

OBJECTIVES To determine the relative incidence of gun victimization versus self defense gun use by civilians in the United States, and the circumstances and probable legality of the self defense uses. METHODS National random digit dial telephone surveys of the adult population were conducted in 1996 and 1999. The Harvard surveys appear unique among private surveys in two respects: asking (1) ...

INTRODUCTION Many people in rural and urban areas own a gun legally or illegally. It is a social phenomenon that apart from the adults, the children become familiar with the guns in early age. CASE PRESENTATION A nine year old boy was shot by accident by his uncle, who was cleaning his gun (carbine) close to where the child was playing. More than 200 pellets were counted in the boy's x-rays. ...

OBJECTIVES We examined parents' beliefs about how children would react to finding guns, with particular emphasis on how parents reasoned about children's actions. METHODS Based on a randomized telephone survey of Northeast Ohio residents, we focused on the 317 urban and 311 rural respondents who had children 5 to 15 years old in their homes. Respondents were asked about gun ownership and thei...

OBJECTIVES To present the prevalence of gun ownership among batterers and describe their self-reported use of guns to threaten intimate partners. METHODS We used multivariate methods to analyze data from 8529 men enrolled in Massachusetts certified batterer intervention programs between 1999 and 2003. RESULTS Seven percent of the sample reported owning guns during the past 3 years. Recent g...

Available online 7 April 2011 Purposes: To determine if perceived risk of criminal victimization, and past criminal victimization experiences, increases the likelihood of a person owning a gun for self-protection, and to determine if defects in past research concerning the way gun ownership was measured had obscured such effects. Methods: We analyzed data on over 2,500 U.S. adults, using differ...

This study examines the relationship between gun availability and crime in a cross-national sample of cities. Data from the International Crime Victimization Survey are used to examine three competing hypotheses. The results of the limited information maximum least squares regression analyses suggest that gun availability influences rates of assault, gun assault, robbery, and gun robbery. These...

We present the case of a 64-year-old man who was referred to our service after sustaining a self-inflicted nail-gun injury to his chest. He received three nails penetrated into his chest. Computer tomography revealed no massive haemorrhage or damage to major vessels. He underwent an emergency sternotomy, two nails caused pericardial perforation and myocardial injury were noted easily and remove...