Specialists in this new discipline put violence in the same category and apply the same scientific tools as those that are being used to reduce and control other epidemics, such as lung cancer and heart disease. They use a public health model that studies the interaction among the host, or person who is injured or killed, the agent of injury or death, and the environment in which that injury or death takes place. They define risk factors, then develop and evaluate methods to prevent violent incidents. Few would deny that violence in the United States is epidemic. The country ranks first among industrialized nations in its rate of violent deaths.
More children die from violence than from disease.
Homicide and suicide account for more than one-third of the country's annual 145,000 traumatic deaths, which include car crashes, boating incidents and plane crashes. Although national firearm death rates decreased in 1994 and 1995, more Americans die from gunshots than car crashes in California, the District of Columbia and eight other states. Prevention approaches were limited to admonitions to drive safely. Then, public health experts, law enforcement agencies, transportation departments, injury control scientists, consumer advocates, public policy makers and vehicle manufacturers began looking at auto deaths and injuries as a public health issue. Instead of studying only how the human factor contributed to crashes, they also investigated the vehicle and the environment.