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Thursday, July 10, 2008
Let's Just Ignore The Facts, Shall We?
A group of emergency room doctors are worried that there will be more accidental shootings now that the Constitution is going to be followed in the District of Columbia.
They are probably right in that accidental shootings may go up. Crime-related shootings, however, may go down, and, not that the doctors are concerned with this fact, but crime in general will probably go down.
Why wouldn't they look at the rest of the data? Then again, why would they? I mean, that would show them something that more than likely goes against their opinions. Can't have that.
UPDATE: h't to Omnibus Driver, who pointed us to this post by GruntDoc. According to GruntDoc, this is more the work of the editors and not the opinion of the every day ER docs. Makes sense to me.
Last month's Supreme Court ruling striking down a strict gun control law in the U.S. capital will lead to more deaths and accidental injuries, the editors of the New England Journal of Medicine said on Wednesday.They went on to cite stats on gun-related deaths in America. They didn't look into the number of gun-related deaths and injuries that have been happening every year in DC with the ban in place. They didn't look at how many of the gun-related injuries and deaths occur due to crime, and how many of those happen in gun-restricted area as opposed to how many occur in areas with less restrictive gun laws.
They joined a growing clamor from medical doctors, especially emergency room physicians, who fear a surge of accidental deaths, murders and suicides if handguns become more easily available than they already are.
The three editors of the prominent medical journal, Dr. Jeffrey Drazen, Stephen Morrissey and Dr. Gregory Curfman, said handguns were far more likely to cause harm than do good.
"In our opinion, there is little reason to expect an optimistic result; research has shown and logic would dictate that fewer restrictions on handguns will result in a substantial increase in injury and death," they wrote in a commentary released in Thursday's issue.
They are probably right in that accidental shootings may go up. Crime-related shootings, however, may go down, and, not that the doctors are concerned with this fact, but crime in general will probably go down.
Why wouldn't they look at the rest of the data? Then again, why would they? I mean, that would show them something that more than likely goes against their opinions. Can't have that.
UPDATE: h't to Omnibus Driver, who pointed us to this post by GruntDoc. According to GruntDoc, this is more the work of the editors and not the opinion of the every day ER docs. Makes sense to me.
