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Abstract
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VioLit summary:
OBJECTIVE:
The objective of this editorial by Koop and Lundberg was to examine some of the past research in relation to violence, and to suggest directions for future prevention of the problem.
METHODOLOGY:
The authors employed a non-experimental exploratory design to discuss a number of issues concerning violence in America today.
FINDINGS/DISCUSSION:
The authors began with the thought that violence had become not only a major issue in the United States, but that it had turned into a medical and public health problem as well. After the 1985 Surgeon General's Workshop on Violence and Public Health, recommendations for violence prevention and treatment were reported to the Senate Committee on Children, Families, Drugs and Alcoholism. However, after seven years, violence in the United States has failed to decrease, and has actually increased in some groups. Each year, one million Americans die prematurely due to intentional homicide or suicide. Between 1960 and 1980, whilst the population increased by 26%, the rate of gun homicides increased by 160%; today, the leading cause of death for teenage boys is gunshot wounds. Death rates due to firearms are substantially lower in other countries. The United Kingdom's rate is one-seventh that of America's, with France's rate being 66% of that in this country and the Netherlands' being 39% of the rate in the United States. The problem of violence has also found its way into schools. Armed assaults in school in California are increasing, and one-third of the students in 31 high school in Illinois have brought weapons to school for self-defense. Suicide is now the third leading cause of death for youth in America, doubling its rate in the last thirty years, primarily due to firearms. Most of the fatalities in the 1992 Los Angeles riots were caused by guns. New research has found that the fatality rates for black youth in metropolitan counties has increased to alarming levels in recent years. Firearm-associated assaults on family in Atlanta are 12 times more likely to end in death than are assaults without guns. Many gun owners keep their weapons loaded in their homes, often not even locked away, despite the presence of children. One-third of the children in Seattle high schools have easy access to handguns, 6% own a gun and 6% of males have taken a handgun to school. The authors suggested that such research has shown that American society today is steeped in violence, in particular handgun violence, and that people have become so numbed by the overwhelming presence of such violence as to consider it an inevitable part of society.
AUTHORS' RECOMMENDATIONS:
The authors suggested that viewing violence as a sociological or law enforcement problem has been a miserable failure. They concluded that the time has come to view violence as a medical and public health emergency. An urgent call was sent to those in authority to support all research into the causes, prevention and cures for violence, to stimulate education of the population about violence and how to address this problem, and to demand legislative changes to reverse the increase in firearm injuries and deaths. Just as the definition of automobile fatalities as a public health issue in the 1970s and 1980s helped to reverse the upward trend of these deaths, so too can the treatment of gunshot wound fatalities reverse the increase in these deaths. However, a major coordinated effort is required in this task. As with owners of motor vehicles, owners of handguns should have to meet certain criteria: to be of a certain age and mental and physical capacity, to be required to demonstrate knowledge and skill in the use of the firearm, to be monitored in the use of the weapon and to forfeit the right to own and use the gun if these criteria are not met. These criteria should be applied to all owners and to all firearms via a system of registration and licensing. As much resistance would be applied to such changes, the authors concluded by inviting any dissenting groups to put forward their own proposals for countering this epidemic. The issue can no longer be placed on hold.
EVALUATION:
The authors present a powerful and thoughtful examination of some of the issues surrounding violence in the United States today. Whilst a more thorough discussion could have been provided of some of the issues, the clearly defined and attainable recommendations for prevention and intervention should be heeded by policy planners and the public alike. (CSPV Abstract - Copyright © 1992-2007 by the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, Institute of Behavioral Science, Regents of the University of Colorado)
KW - Violence Prevention
KW - Public Health Approach
KW - Prevention Recommendations
KW - Policy Recommendations
KW - Firearms Violence
KW - Juvenile Offender
KW - Juvenile Violence
KW - Adult Offender
KW - Adult Violence
KW - School Violence
KW - Community Violence |