Gun Industry Serious About Preventing Suicides By Firearms

The National Shooting Sports Foundation and the American Foundation to Prevent Suicide have joined launched an initiative on January 17, 2017, in Las Vegas. In the initiative, the gun dealers and gun ranges will be supplied brochures to help them understand the warning signs of people who are at risk of committing suicide. If they can identify that someone is at risk of committing suicide with the gun, they might be able to prevent such incidents.

 The Fox News reported that till now, the gun industry has been wary of encouraging a gun control agenda while the suicide prevention groups were uncertain of digging into a strategy that might trigger political controversies. It took a year for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention to convince the National Sports Shooting Foundation to join hands with them. Robert Gebbia, CEO of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, said that they had to convince the gun industry that they were not gun control activists and all they wanted was to limit access to guns to people who have serious health problems and are at risk.

More than 44,000 American commit suicide every year, and 50% of them choose a firearm to do so. 90% of people who shoot themselves turn up dead. The unlikely partnership now aims to bring down the number of suicides by at least 10,000 people per annum in the next decade.

According to the Harvard School of Public Health, gun owners and health professionals are now coming together to keep suicidal people away from firearms. In more than 20 states, there are suicide-prevention projects that aim to reduce a suicidal person's access to lethal methods. In Nevada, suicide prevention displays are put up at gun shows. In Utah, those who apply for gun permits have to undergo a suicide prevention module too.

The national suicide initiative is now distributing brochures which tell firearm dealers on how to find out if a person has depression, how to reach out to him or her, and how to store a firearm and lock it safely. The gun industry has also stepped up its efforts in ensuring safer handling and storage of firearms and includes child-safe locks in weapons.