According to estimates, firearm attacks injured another 70,000 victims, some of whom were left permanently disabled. In 1985 (the latest year for which data are available), the cost of shootings--either by others, through self-inflicted wounds, or in accidents--was estimated to be more than $14 billion nationwide for medical care, long-term disability, and premature death. In robberies and assaults, victims are far more likely to die when the perpetrator is armed with a gun than when he or she has another weapon or is unarmed. An accidental gunshot is also a lethal disposition.
Obviously, there are different types of gun murder. There is 1st degree, premeditated murder, in which case the gun just made it easier, but the killer probably would have killed anyway, given that he had time to premeditate. But after that, there is murder in course of other crime, acquaintance murders in the heat of passion, and criminal negligence. And naturally, there are the non-lethal injuries from firearms as well. These non-lethal injuries have actually been going down recently, but this is not because the number of shootings is going down; but rather that emergency room doctors and technology are getting better equipped to deal with gunshot victims. (N.Y. Times News Service, 1996).
In addition, although we hear a great deal about the tens of thousands who die from gunshot wounds, we don't hear enough about the countless tens of thousands of others who are injured by gunshot wounds. Increasingly, hospital emergency rooms are getting better at treating gunshot wounds, which leads to less gunshot deaths. For this reason, looking at gunshot deaths alone is misleading, and only a small part of the picture. (Kleck) Residents of homes where a gun is present are 5 times more likely to experience a suicide rather than residents of homes without guns. (Kellermann et al, pp. 467-472) Although the reader may or may not disagree with the morality behind suicide being illegal, the fact remains that a gun makes it easier to commit suicide in a fit of rage, depression, or under the influence of drugs or alcohol.
