The AAP’s Stance on Gun Safety
The safest home for a child is a home without a gun. However, if a gun is in present in the home of a child, the gun should be stored unloaded and locked, with the ammunition locked separately, so that a child cannot access the gun.
More than 1.5 million children in the United States live in a home with at least one loaded, unlocked firearm. Studies have shown that storing household guns unloaded and locked reduces the risk of unintentional injury and suicide for children and adolescents.
Pediatricians play a key role in injury prevention by providing anticipatory guidance to parents to help minimize the risk of injury in the child’s everyday environment. In controlled studies, individuals who received physician counseling were more likely to report the adoption of 1 or more safe gun-storage practices.
Counseling parents on firearm ownership and safe storage practices is no different than counseling for other products or injury risks such as seat belt use or parental tobacco use and serves the same purpose – to mitigate risk of injury to children in the environments in which they live and play. Anticipatory guidance is a major component of well-child care and injury-visits and cover multiple topics including child passenger safety, drowning prevention, parental tobacco use, and developmental milestones
What is licensing, and how does it work?
Too many people who should not have access to guns can buy them legally. Many others who cannot legally buy guns can get them easily through illegal channels. Licensing would help address both of these flaws in the current system. Under a responsible licensing scheme, an applicant for a license must be fingerprinted and pass a thorough, extensive background check. Authorities must have enough time to ensure that the check is complete.
In addition to the background check, the applicant must demonstrate an understanding of how to handle a gun safely and legally. Like a driver's test, this would include both a written test and a hands-on demonstration of safe handling and proficiency.
What is registration and how does it work?
Registration creates accountability for gun owners, to protect against illegal sales and to promote responsible use and storage. Studies show that guns used in crimes tend to be relatively new guns that were legally sold within a few years of the crime. Because most of the guns in circulation are much older, this suggests that guns used in crimes tend to get to criminals through subsequent illegal sales rather than through theft. That means that some people who buy new guns resell them illegally. Without registration, we have no reliable way to spot illegal sales or to identify the sellers.
A responsible registration system would require gun owners to claim responsibility for each specific gun they buy or own. Every year, the gun owner would be required either to renew the registration for each gun or to explain why s/he should no longer be responsible for its whereabouts.
For morning information visit the following website:
Coalition to Stop Gun Violence – The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence seeks to secure freedom from gun violence through research, strategic engagement and effective policy advocacy.
AAP INFO
The safest home for a child is a home without a gun. However, if a gun is in present in the home of a child, the gun should be stored unloaded and locked, with the ammunition locked separately, so that a child cannot access the gun.
More than 1.5 million children in the United States live in a home with at least one loaded, unlocked firearm. Studies have shown that storing household guns unloaded and locked reduces the risk of unintentional injury and suicide for children and adolescents.
Pediatricians play a key role in injury prevention by providing anticipatory guidance to parents to help minimize the risk of injury in the child’s everyday environment. In controlled studies, individuals who received physician counseling were more likely to report the adoption of 1 or more safe gun-storage practices.
Counseling parents on firearm ownership and safe storage practices is no different than counseling for other products or injury risks such as seat belt use or parental tobacco use and serves the same purpose – to mitigate risk of injury to children in the environments in which they live and play. Anticipatory guidance is a major component of well-child care and injury-visits and cover multiple topics including child passenger safety, drowning prevention, parental tobacco use, and developmental milestones
What is licensing, and how does it work?
Too many people who should not have access to guns can buy them legally. Many others who cannot legally buy guns can get them easily through illegal channels. Licensing would help address both of these flaws in the current system. Under a responsible licensing scheme, an applicant for a license must be fingerprinted and pass a thorough, extensive background check. Authorities must have enough time to ensure that the check is complete.
In addition to the background check, the applicant must demonstrate an understanding of how to handle a gun safely and legally. Like a driver's test, this would include both a written test and a hands-on demonstration of safe handling and proficiency.
What is registration and how does it work?
Registration creates accountability for gun owners, to protect against illegal sales and to promote responsible use and storage. Studies show that guns used in crimes tend to be relatively new guns that were legally sold within a few years of the crime. Because most of the guns in circulation are much older, this suggests that guns used in crimes tend to get to criminals through subsequent illegal sales rather than through theft. That means that some people who buy new guns resell them illegally. Without registration, we have no reliable way to spot illegal sales or to identify the sellers.
A responsible registration system would require gun owners to claim responsibility for each specific gun they buy or own. Every year, the gun owner would be required either to renew the registration for each gun or to explain why s/he should no longer be responsible for its whereabouts.
For morning information visit the following website:
Coalition to Stop Gun Violence – The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence seeks to secure freedom from gun violence through research, strategic engagement and effective policy advocacy.
AAP INFO