I just found some interesting figures that I’d like to share.
As most people know, our Commonwealth has perhaps the toughest gun laws in the country. Our good friends to the north, New Hampshire, take the opposite approach. For example, a co-worker who grew up in NH recently told me about the scene after his grandmother’s death when the family haggled over who would get which gun (I recall she had six or so).
Turns out that Mass has roughly half the rate of firearms deaths compared to NH. MA is 3.1 per 100,000, vs 5.8 for NH
But it gets even more interesting.
Unfortunately, it seems that MA has three times the murder rate of NH, 2.6 per 100,000 vs. 0.8.
Putting the numbers together, and assuming that most non-homicide gun deaths would not occur if guns weren’t handy, it indicates that:
— almost all the firearms deaths in MA are due to homicides.
— in NH, by contrast, about 6 people are killed with guns by accident for every one person killed on purpose.
— all told, because of wildly different gun policies, more people end up dead from guns in NH than in MA.
I guess having lots of guns around results in a lot of preventable deaths.
Makes sense, but it’s interesting to see that the statistics confirm it.
Too many hunters head north for their “manly adventure” with guns, beer, and a couple sandwiches. Are the accidents in NH victims of Msshles?
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p>As with driving a car, flying a airplane, firearms training should be necessary part of ownership and use. In Massachusetts an owner must attend firearms training. What the owner does with that training is part of individual responsibility as with a car or airplane.
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p>I doubt too many homicides are committed with legal firearms. We can pass whatever laws we want to stop illegal firearms, but what is the definition of illegal?
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p>Right.
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p>“Among the many misdeeds of British rule in India, history will look upon the Act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest.” –Mahatma Mohandas K. Gandhi