Details:

• Alternative Title:
  Inj Prev
• Personal Author:
  Schwebel, David C.
• Description:
  Background.
  
  Firearms kill over 130 Americans daily. Most deaths are the result of intentional acts, but in 2021, 549 deaths (1.5/day) were unintentional. Strategies to prevent unintentional versus intentional firearms deaths differ. This study describes unintentional firearm-related mortality across the United States and within individual states between 2001 and 2021 and considers factors that might explain disparities across states.
  
  Methods.
  
  Unintentional firearms mortality from 2001–2021, both for the full country and by state, were obtained online along with data for five state-level predictors: rurality, non-white population, poverty, population, gun ownership.
  
  Results.
  
  The highest unintentional firearm-related mortality rates clustered in Southeastern states, followed by states in the Northern Plains and Mountain West. The lowest rates were in the Northeast, followed by scattered states in the West and Midwest. At the state level, unintentional firearms mortality correlated positively with percent below the poverty level (r=.54, p<.01), rural (r=.59, p<.01), and owning firearms (r=.72, p<.01). In a multivariable regression model predicting unintentional firearms mortality by state, three factors emerged as significant: percent white (β=−.22, p<.05), below the poverty level (β=.43, p<.01), and owning firearms (β=.54, p<.01).
  
  Conclusions.
  
  Large disparities exist across the 50 United States in unintentional firearms mortality. Crude rates in the most afflicted states are ~10 times those in the least afflicted states. Nationwide, over 12,000 lives were lost to unintentional firearms mortality between 2001 and 2021. Factors that create disparities are multifaceted and include rurality, poverty, and firearms ownership.
  
  
• Keywords:
  [+]

  Disparities Firearms Gun Injuries Safety Unintentional Injuries United States
• Source:
  Inj Prev.
• Pubmed ID:
  39053923
• Pubmed Central ID:
  PMC11682187
• Document Type:
  Journal Article
• Funding:
  R01 CE003307/CE/NCIPC CDC HHSUnited States/
• Collection(s):
  CDC Public Access
• Main Document Checksum:
  [+]

  urn:sha-512:ac4feb02c304176098c25c8874994c1dc0fc0cfbe957baf7ad8e87b38b6ddb202edbf33dfb5d56f31a62846a71db1544e5130023406fa11bb20e2bd6f400f9d9
• File Type:

• Supporting Files:
  No Additional Files