Reexamining the association between child access prevention gun laws and unintentional shooting deaths of children.
BACKGROUND
A previous study estimated that child access prevention (CAP) laws, which hold adults criminally liable for unsafe firearm storage in the environment of children, were associated with a 23% decline in unintentional firearm mortality rates among children.


OBJECTIVE
To reassess the effects of CAP laws and more fully examine the consistency of the estimated law effects across states.


METHODS
A pooled time-series study of unintentional firearm mortality among children from 1979 through 1997. Setting. The 50 states and the District of Columbia.


METHODS
All children <15 years.


METHODS
Rates of unintentional deaths attributable to firearms.


RESULTS
When the effects of all 15 state CAP laws enacted before 1998 were aggregated, the laws were associated with a 17% decline unintentional firearm death rates among children. The laws' effects were not equal across states. Florida's CAP law was associated with a 51% decline; however, there were no statistically significant aggregate or state-specific law effects in the other 14 states with CAP laws.


CONCLUSIONS
Florida's CAP law-1 of only 3 such laws allowing felony prosecution of violators-appears to have significantly reduced unintentional firearm deaths to children. However, there is no evidence of effects in the other 14 states with CAP laws.
Webster
D W
DW
Center for Gun Policy and Research, Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health, Baltimore, Maryland, USA. dwebster@jhsph.edu
Starnes
M
M
D000056:Accident Prevention; D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D005389:Firearms / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D006708:Homicide / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence* / Q000517:prevention & control* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D014481:United States; D014950:Wounds, Penetrating / Q000517:prevention & control*