Reducing Gun Access Can Cut Suicide Rates: Study

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 29th july, 2016) : Legislation reducing access to firearms can lower suicide rates in the US, said a study based on examination of relationship between gun ownership and suicide rates around the world. In 2014, of the more than 33,500 firearm deaths in the US, over 21,000 were the result of suicide.

About 38 per cent of US households own at least one gun, making firearms widely available to those at risk of suicide, the study authors pointed out in their findings, published in the American Journal of Psychiatry. The researchers from Columbia University Medical Center (CUMC) and New York State Psychiatric Institute (NYSPI) extrapolated from gun control measures implemented elsewhere in considering what might be possible and effective in preventing firearm suicides in the US.