WHAT DIFFERENCE COULD A GUN LAW MAKE?
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While suicide has rarely been the basis for public support of the passage
of specific gun laws, suicide prevention may be the unintended by-product
of such laws. For example, federal ownership standards that have been set
by the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act might reduce the risk of
gun suicide among several high-risk groups, including persons with a history
of violent behavior, substance abuse, and severe mental disorder. Gun
storage laws might reduce the risk of suicide among children and adolescents;
gun buy-backs might reduce the stock of infrequently used guns that
might be used for suicide, and cooling off periods could reduce the use of
guns in suicides motivated by transient suicidal states. But gun policies
could also increase the risk of suicide. For example, mental health advocates
have opposed the creation of registries of persons with a history of
mental illness, arguing that the stigma of appearing in a state-sponsored
registry could lead some persons to refuse needed mental health treatment,
thus increasing rather than decreasing the risk of a lethal outcome.
Tables 7-4, 7-5, and 7-6 summarize studies of the effects of specific gun
laws. Several cross-sectional and time-series studies do report a decline in
firearm suicides in response to gun control legislation, but so far there is
little evidence for an effect on the overall risk of suicide.