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Alcohol policies, firearm policies, and suicide in the United States: a lagged cross-sectional study

BACKGROUND: Alcohol and firearms are commonly involved in suicide in the United States. State alcohol and firearm policies may impact alcohol and firearm related suicide, yet little is known about these relationships. This study examines relationships between state alcohol and firearm policies and s...

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Autores principales: Coleman, Sharon M., Lira, Marlene C., Blanchette, Jason, Heeren, Timothy C., Naimi, Timothy S.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7919072/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33641667
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-021-10216-x
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author Coleman, Sharon M.
Lira, Marlene C.
Blanchette, Jason
Heeren, Timothy C.
Naimi, Timothy S.
author_facet Coleman, Sharon M.
Lira, Marlene C.
Blanchette, Jason
Heeren, Timothy C.
Naimi, Timothy S.
author_sort Coleman, Sharon M.
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Alcohol and firearms are commonly involved in suicide in the United States. State alcohol and firearm policies may impact alcohol and firearm related suicide, yet little is known about these relationships. This study examines relationships between state alcohol and firearm policies and suicides involving alcohol, guns, or both, and explores interactive policy associations. METHODS: Alcohol policies were assessed with the Alcohol Policy Scale. Firearm policies were assessed using the Gun Law Scorecard from Giffords Law Center. Suicide data from the National Violent Death Reporting System in 2015 covered 22 states. State- and individual-level GEE Poisson and logistic regression models assessed relationships between policies and firearm- and/or alcohol-involved suicides with a 1-year lag. RESULTS: In 2015, there were 8996 suicide deaths with blood alcohol concentration test results in the 22 included states. Of those deaths, alcohol and/or firearms were involved in 5749 or 63.9%. Higher alcohol and gun law scores were associated with reduced incidence rates and odds of suicides involving either alcohol or firearms (adjusted incidence rate ratios [IRR] 0.72 (95% CI 0.63, 0.83) for alcohol policies, 0.86 (95% CI 0.82, 0.90) for firearm policies). Relationships were similar for suicides involving both alcohol and firearms, and there was an interactive effect, such that states with restrictive policies for both had the lowest rates of suicides involving alcohol or guns. CONCLUSIONS: More restrictive alcohol and firearm policies are associated with lower rates and odds of suicides involving alcohol or firearms, and alcohol and firearms, and may be a promising means by which to reduce suicide.
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spelling pubmed-79190722021-03-02 Alcohol policies, firearm policies, and suicide in the United States: a lagged cross-sectional study Coleman, Sharon M. Lira, Marlene C. Blanchette, Jason Heeren, Timothy C. Naimi, Timothy S. BMC Public Health Research Article BACKGROUND: Alcohol and firearms are commonly involved in suicide in the United States. State alcohol and firearm policies may impact alcohol and firearm related suicide, yet little is known about these relationships. This study examines relationships between state alcohol and firearm policies and suicides involving alcohol, guns, or both, and explores interactive policy associations. METHODS: Alcohol policies were assessed with the Alcohol Policy Scale. Firearm policies were assessed using the Gun Law Scorecard from Giffords Law Center. Suicide data from the National Violent Death Reporting System in 2015 covered 22 states. State- and individual-level GEE Poisson and logistic regression models assessed relationships between policies and firearm- and/or alcohol-involved suicides with a 1-year lag. RESULTS: In 2015, there were 8996 suicide deaths with blood alcohol concentration test results in the 22 included states. Of those deaths, alcohol and/or firearms were involved in 5749 or 63.9%. Higher alcohol and gun law scores were associated with reduced incidence rates and odds of suicides involving either alcohol or firearms (adjusted incidence rate ratios [IRR] 0.72 (95% CI 0.63, 0.83) for alcohol policies, 0.86 (95% CI 0.82, 0.90) for firearm policies). Relationships were similar for suicides involving both alcohol and firearms, and there was an interactive effect, such that states with restrictive policies for both had the lowest rates of suicides involving alcohol or guns. CONCLUSIONS: More restrictive alcohol and firearm policies are associated with lower rates and odds of suicides involving alcohol or firearms, and alcohol and firearms, and may be a promising means by which to reduce suicide. BioMed Central 2021-03-01 /pmc/articles/PMC7919072/ /pubmed/33641667 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-021-10216-x Text en © The Author(s) 2021 Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
spellingShingle Research Article
Coleman, Sharon M.
Lira, Marlene C.
Blanchette, Jason
Heeren, Timothy C.
Naimi, Timothy S.
Alcohol policies, firearm policies, and suicide in the United States: a lagged cross-sectional study
title Alcohol policies, firearm policies, and suicide in the United States: a lagged cross-sectional study
title_full Alcohol policies, firearm policies, and suicide in the United States: a lagged cross-sectional study
title_fullStr Alcohol policies, firearm policies, and suicide in the United States: a lagged cross-sectional study
title_full_unstemmed Alcohol policies, firearm policies, and suicide in the United States: a lagged cross-sectional study
title_short Alcohol policies, firearm policies, and suicide in the United States: a lagged cross-sectional study
title_sort alcohol policies, firearm policies, and suicide in the united states: a lagged cross-sectional study
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7919072/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33641667
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-021-10216-x
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