From 1987 to 1996, nearly 2,200 American children 14 years of age and younger died from unintentional shootings. An estimated 10 times that number are treated in U.S. hospital emergency rooms each year for nonfatal unintentional gunshot wounds. Although the victims of unintentional gunshot wounds are less likely to die than the victims of intentionally inflicted gunshot injuries, those who survive like all gunshot victims may suffer long-term impairment and permanent disability. Unlike men, women are at an increased risk of firearms homicide by people known to them. The increased risk of homicide associated with firearms was attributable to the homicides at the hands of a spouse, intimate acquaintance, or close relative.
Males are over six times as likely than females to be killed by a firearm.
Firearm injury death rates are higher for males than females in all age groups ranging from 1.3 times higher for those aged one to four years to 27.5 times higher for those 85 years of age and older. A 1997 study that compared firearm death rates in 26 industrialized countries among children less than 15 years old found that the firearms homicide rate among U.S. children was nearly 16 times higher than the rate among children in the other 25 industrialized countries combined. Since 1960, more than a million Americans have died in firearm suicides, homicides, and unintentional shootings. In 1996 alone, more than 34,000 Americans died by gunfire. According to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, by the year 2003 gun shots will kill more people than motor vehicles.