/ stevenwarran's Library/ Notes/ June 27, 1993, Post-Tribune (IN) Endangered Species: Teen Suicide Attempts Soars, and Guns Up the Success Rate,
June 27, 1993, Post-Tribune (IN) Endangered Species: Teen Suicide Attempts Soars, and Guns Up the Success Rate,
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June 27, 1993, Post-Tribune (IN) Endangered Species: Teen Suicide Attempts Soars, and Guns Up the Success Rate,
In the basement of his Lemont, Ill., home, 14-year-old Paul Hoffman puts the barrel of a .22-caliber rifle under his chin and pulls the trigger. The gun had been kept in his parent's bedroom closet. Paul's last words: "My father doesn't love me." In rural Philadelphia, Miss., a 16-year-old girl shoots herself in the head after an argument with her boyfriend. She got the gun from her mother's car.
In suburban San Diego, Calif., a 15-year-old girl runs into her parents' bedroom after fighting with her mother. Minutes later, a shot rings out.
"I didn't think she knew where the gun was," her grief-stricken father said. "I didn't think she knew where I hid the bullets. I didn't think she knew we even had a gun." A fatal combination
Adolescent angst and a loaded gun. In a nation where half the homes contain at least one firearm, it's a fatal combination that annually kills more than 1,400 American youths between 10 and 19 years old: one every six hours.
Alarmed by rising teen suicide rates, a growing number of suicide prevention experts, grieving parents and gun owners want to focus attention on a prevention strategy that both sides in the volatile gun debate can agree on: saving kids from themselves by keeping guns out of their reach.
The most optimistic advocates predict that by restricting teen-agers' access to guns, suicides among adolescents could be reduced by 20 percent. That's nearly 300 teen-agers a year.
"This is an area where we may be able to rise above the ideological mire that we've been stuck in for so long," said Dr. James Mercy, acting head of the Violence Prevention Division of the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control. Teen suicide rates soar
Teen suicide rates have quadrupled since 1950, federal statistics show. A panel of leading firearm researchers concluded last year that the increase was fueled by rapid growth in gun suicides, noting that hangings and other non- firearm suicides had remained essentially unchanged since the 1930s.
An equally disturbing trend of self-inflicted deaths has surfaced among younger children, according to a new report. Between 1979 and 1988, the suicide rate among children 10-14 jumped 75 percent, the highest rate increase for all youth age groups, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported last week.
Overall in 1990, there were 2,237 suicides among 10-to-19-year-olds, according to the latest figures from the National Center for Health Statistics.
Nearly two-thirds - 142 children between 10 and 14 and 1,332 teen-agers between 15 and 19 - killed themselves with a gun.
Guns also put at risk large numbers of young people who consider suicide. A 1990 nationwide federal health survey of high school students found that more than one in four had thought seriously about attempting suicide. Sixteen percent made a specific plan to commit suicide; of those, about half tried - and needed medical attention. Gun debate gets in way
But teen suicides often go unnoticed in the contentious national debate over firearm violence and gun control.
"It's a piece of the firearm story that has not been told," said Lois Fingerhut, an epidemiologist for the National Center for Health Statistics who has published several studies analyzing firearm deaths among children, teens and young adults.
In a nationwide survey of youth suicide prevention programs last September, none reported a major effort to limit gun access. And government resources are being targeted at other problems: $10 million to fight violence against women and $6 million to prevent homicide and other interpersonal violence against young people.
One hopeful sign: In April, the American Association of Suicidology, the largest organization of suicide professionals, voted to organize a workshop to bring together health advocates and gun enthusiasts "to seek common ground on the issue of reducing unsupervised access to firearms among our nation's youth."
"Sounds good to me. We're here and waiting," said Paul Blackman, research coordinator for the National Rifle Association. "The message to parents has long been: Limit access to guns (and) make sure they're being stored safely. ... There is no question if a suicidal teen-ager is in the household, get the guns out of the households." NRA skeptical
Still, the NRA is skeptical. The organization notes that the suicidology group sides with gun control advocates in favoring laws that restrict gun access.
And with politicians proposing everything from a complete ban on handguns to the Brady bill's five-day pre-purchase waiting period, gun rights lobbyists fear that gun control activists are using the youth suicide issue as a smokescreen.
"Obviously, we're not going to cooperate if the idea is handguns should be banned," Blackman said.
Blackman and a handful of other researchers don't think banning handguns is the answer. A new study by a University of Washington researcher compared the overall suicide rates in Canada and the United States. Brandon Centerwall found that although handgun availability in the United States was 10 times greater, the Canadian suicide rate was 13 percent higher. Japan, too, gun control critics say, has very low rates of gun ownership but has suicide rates as high or higher than in the United States. Studies show risk
But the CDC and most suicide researchers say there is more compelling evidence to suggest the availability of firearms increases the risk of suicide.
A 1991 study in western Pennsylvania found that the risk of youth suicide increases when guns are present in the home, no matter how carefully they are stored.
And a study published last month by the same team found that a loaded gun in the home poses a serious risk even when a teen is not mentally ill.
"We used to say if you have a kid who's suicidal or psychiatrically ill, get the guns out of the home. Now our point is that it seems as if guns pose a hazard for suicide no matter what risk category you're in," said the author, Dr. David Brent of the University of Pittsburgh.
No one expects to prevent all or even most of the child and teen suicides reported every year. Suicide among all ages remains one of the nation's most enduring public health problems. And guns are a method rather than a cause for an act that suicide experts describe as infinitely complex in its motives.
"We're always talking about a 12 or 15 or 30 variable equation," agrees David C. Clark, director of the Center for Suicide Research and Prevention in Chicago.
"We're trying to pick out single variables in the string that we might be able to attack in the hope that if we remove that one element, that one brick from the wall, the whole wall will come tumbling down. I think (reducing access to guns) is a brick, and I think the rates will drop." Guns make attempts final
Said Mercy: "Without ready access to guns, many youth suicides might remain suicide attempts."
Unlike elderly suicides who seem more likely to have a "clear and sustained intent" to kill themselves, "young people ... are impulsive and not particularly skilled in communication," he and two other CDC researchers said in a 1991 editorial in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
"For them, a suicide attempt may be an attempt to communicate that they are in great pain, although they may be ambivalent about wanting to die. For such adolescents, ready access to a firearm may guarantee that their plea for help will not be heard," the researchers said.
Think back to your own teen-age years, suicide experts advise parents who have guns and adolescents at home.
"If your girlfriend belittles you at the mall, there's just no reason to live. If your parents treat you badly, it's like the worst disaster on earth that you can never overcome. But the next morning you've forgotten it because something else neat happened," said Patrick O'Carroll, former chief of the CDC's intentional injury section.
"That's what adolescence is like, a tremendously volatile period with swings between despair and hysterical rapture. You put a gun into that mix and an impulsive desire to kill yourself becomes a final act." Haunted by what-ifs
Parents who lose a child to firearm suicide are forever haunted by the what-ifs. Andrea Denton, who leads a support group for suicide survivors in Akron, Ohio, recalls the teen-age girl who was arguing with her boyfriend on the phone when her father came in from hunting and put the gun down in the kitchen. "She picked it up, said 'I'll show you,' and shot herself," said Denton.
"I just wonder would they have done it had that gun not been available," she said of this and other teen-age suicides. "If they had to go find a gun or look for a piece of rope to hang themselves, the act might never have been carried out. But the gun is there, they use it and it's over."
Eight years after her son Paul committed suicide, Tish Hoffman still wonders. "Had the gun not been available I realize now he might have tried something else, but it might not have been fatal and we could have gotten him help." Where survivors can go for help
The American Association of Suicidology has a nationwide network of support groups for survivors of suicide.
Address:
2459 South Ash St.
Denver, CO 80222
Phone: 303-692-0985
For help Locally:
The Mental Health Association in Lake County: 845-2720
Contact Cares hotlines: 769-3141, 374-7660, 462-9880, 996-5439
Porter-Stark Services, 464-8541
Rap Line, 938-0900
Porter County Youth Services Bureau, 464-9585
In suburban San Diego, Calif., a 15-year-old girl runs into her parents' bedroom after fighting with her mother. Minutes later, a shot rings out.
"I didn't think she knew where the gun was," her grief-stricken father said. "I didn't think she knew where I hid the bullets. I didn't think she knew we even had a gun." A fatal combination
Adolescent angst and a loaded gun. In a nation where half the homes contain at least one firearm, it's a fatal combination that annually kills more than 1,400 American youths between 10 and 19 years old: one every six hours.
Alarmed by rising teen suicide rates, a growing number of suicide prevention experts, grieving parents and gun owners want to focus attention on a prevention strategy that both sides in the volatile gun debate can agree on: saving kids from themselves by keeping guns out of their reach.
The most optimistic advocates predict that by restricting teen-agers' access to guns, suicides among adolescents could be reduced by 20 percent. That's nearly 300 teen-agers a year.
"This is an area where we may be able to rise above the ideological mire that we've been stuck in for so long," said Dr. James Mercy, acting head of the Violence Prevention Division of the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control. Teen suicide rates soar
Teen suicide rates have quadrupled since 1950, federal statistics show. A panel of leading firearm researchers concluded last year that the increase was fueled by rapid growth in gun suicides, noting that hangings and other non- firearm suicides had remained essentially unchanged since the 1930s.
An equally disturbing trend of self-inflicted deaths has surfaced among younger children, according to a new report. Between 1979 and 1988, the suicide rate among children 10-14 jumped 75 percent, the highest rate increase for all youth age groups, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported last week.
Overall in 1990, there were 2,237 suicides among 10-to-19-year-olds, according to the latest figures from the National Center for Health Statistics.
Nearly two-thirds - 142 children between 10 and 14 and 1,332 teen-agers between 15 and 19 - killed themselves with a gun.
Guns also put at risk large numbers of young people who consider suicide. A 1990 nationwide federal health survey of high school students found that more than one in four had thought seriously about attempting suicide. Sixteen percent made a specific plan to commit suicide; of those, about half tried - and needed medical attention. Gun debate gets in way
But teen suicides often go unnoticed in the contentious national debate over firearm violence and gun control.
"It's a piece of the firearm story that has not been told," said Lois Fingerhut, an epidemiologist for the National Center for Health Statistics who has published several studies analyzing firearm deaths among children, teens and young adults.
In a nationwide survey of youth suicide prevention programs last September, none reported a major effort to limit gun access. And government resources are being targeted at other problems: $10 million to fight violence against women and $6 million to prevent homicide and other interpersonal violence against young people.
One hopeful sign: In April, the American Association of Suicidology, the largest organization of suicide professionals, voted to organize a workshop to bring together health advocates and gun enthusiasts "to seek common ground on the issue of reducing unsupervised access to firearms among our nation's youth."
"Sounds good to me. We're here and waiting," said Paul Blackman, research coordinator for the National Rifle Association. "The message to parents has long been: Limit access to guns (and) make sure they're being stored safely. ... There is no question if a suicidal teen-ager is in the household, get the guns out of the households." NRA skeptical
Still, the NRA is skeptical. The organization notes that the suicidology group sides with gun control advocates in favoring laws that restrict gun access.
And with politicians proposing everything from a complete ban on handguns to the Brady bill's five-day pre-purchase waiting period, gun rights lobbyists fear that gun control activists are using the youth suicide issue as a smokescreen.
"Obviously, we're not going to cooperate if the idea is handguns should be banned," Blackman said.
Blackman and a handful of other researchers don't think banning handguns is the answer. A new study by a University of Washington researcher compared the overall suicide rates in Canada and the United States. Brandon Centerwall found that although handgun availability in the United States was 10 times greater, the Canadian suicide rate was 13 percent higher. Japan, too, gun control critics say, has very low rates of gun ownership but has suicide rates as high or higher than in the United States. Studies show risk
But the CDC and most suicide researchers say there is more compelling evidence to suggest the availability of firearms increases the risk of suicide.
A 1991 study in western Pennsylvania found that the risk of youth suicide increases when guns are present in the home, no matter how carefully they are stored.
And a study published last month by the same team found that a loaded gun in the home poses a serious risk even when a teen is not mentally ill.
"We used to say if you have a kid who's suicidal or psychiatrically ill, get the guns out of the home. Now our point is that it seems as if guns pose a hazard for suicide no matter what risk category you're in," said the author, Dr. David Brent of the University of Pittsburgh.
No one expects to prevent all or even most of the child and teen suicides reported every year. Suicide among all ages remains one of the nation's most enduring public health problems. And guns are a method rather than a cause for an act that suicide experts describe as infinitely complex in its motives.
"We're always talking about a 12 or 15 or 30 variable equation," agrees David C. Clark, director of the Center for Suicide Research and Prevention in Chicago.
"We're trying to pick out single variables in the string that we might be able to attack in the hope that if we remove that one element, that one brick from the wall, the whole wall will come tumbling down. I think (reducing access to guns) is a brick, and I think the rates will drop." Guns make attempts final
Said Mercy: "Without ready access to guns, many youth suicides might remain suicide attempts."
Unlike elderly suicides who seem more likely to have a "clear and sustained intent" to kill themselves, "young people ... are impulsive and not particularly skilled in communication," he and two other CDC researchers said in a 1991 editorial in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
"For them, a suicide attempt may be an attempt to communicate that they are in great pain, although they may be ambivalent about wanting to die. For such adolescents, ready access to a firearm may guarantee that their plea for help will not be heard," the researchers said.
Think back to your own teen-age years, suicide experts advise parents who have guns and adolescents at home.
"If your girlfriend belittles you at the mall, there's just no reason to live. If your parents treat you badly, it's like the worst disaster on earth that you can never overcome. But the next morning you've forgotten it because something else neat happened," said Patrick O'Carroll, former chief of the CDC's intentional injury section.
"That's what adolescence is like, a tremendously volatile period with swings between despair and hysterical rapture. You put a gun into that mix and an impulsive desire to kill yourself becomes a final act." Haunted by what-ifs
Parents who lose a child to firearm suicide are forever haunted by the what-ifs. Andrea Denton, who leads a support group for suicide survivors in Akron, Ohio, recalls the teen-age girl who was arguing with her boyfriend on the phone when her father came in from hunting and put the gun down in the kitchen. "She picked it up, said 'I'll show you,' and shot herself," said Denton.
"I just wonder would they have done it had that gun not been available," she said of this and other teen-age suicides. "If they had to go find a gun or look for a piece of rope to hang themselves, the act might never have been carried out. But the gun is there, they use it and it's over."
Eight years after her son Paul committed suicide, Tish Hoffman still wonders. "Had the gun not been available I realize now he might have tried something else, but it might not have been fatal and we could have gotten him help." Where survivors can go for help
The American Association of Suicidology has a nationwide network of support groups for survivors of suicide.
Address:
2459 South Ash St.
Denver, CO 80222
Phone: 303-692-0985
For help Locally:
The Mental Health Association in Lake County: 845-2720
Contact Cares hotlines: 769-3141, 374-7660, 462-9880, 996-5439
Porter-Stark Services, 464-8541
Rap Line, 938-0900
Porter County Youth Services Bureau, 464-9585
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