Rand Health Research Highlights. Guns in the Family: Firearm Storage Patterns in U.S. Homes With Children

摘要

Many children in the United States have access to firearms in their homes, and the consequences can be tragic. Recent headlines tell a sad and increasingly familiar story: 'Boy charged with attempted murder in shooting of 14-year-old girl', 'Boy, 4, shot by 6-year-old', Just a routine school shooting....Public health agencies, organizations representing children, and groups representing firearm owners offer consistent guidelines about how to store firearms to make them inaccessible to children: unload them, lock them up, and store them separately from ammunition. However, a RAND analysis of data regarding firearm ownership and storage patterns found that of the families in the United States with children and firearms, fewer than half store their firearms unloaded, locked, and away from ammunition. Using nationally representative data from a large interview survey by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), RAND researchers examined the prevalence of firearms in U.S. homes with children under 18 years old and learned how those firearms are stored.