1 in 10 Suicides Committed with Recently Purchased Guns

According to information abstracted from the state medical examiner’s death investigation reports, among the 144 firearm suicides that o=ccurred over a two-year period ending June 30, 2009, nearly one in 10 were committed with a gun that was purchased or rented within a week of the suicide (usually within hours).

The figure is likely an underestimate since two-thirds of the reports made no mention of when the gun was obtained.

That information comes from The Connect Program, a national best practice suicide prevention program of the New Hampshire Firearm Safety Coalition.

As reported by ABC News: "It's not that gun owners are more likely to be suicidal or depressed. It's that guns are the most lethal way for someone to take their own life," said Elaine Frank, with the New Hampshire Firearm Safety Coalition. Firearm suicides account for more deaths than all other suicide methods combined and 65 percent of all gun deaths in the U.S., according to figures from 2011 provided by gunpolicy.org, an international group working to reduce gun injuries.

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