People suffering from severe depression should be banned from purchasing/carrying guns

[HereSince1628]

38. People aren't born with depression...it is a condition that can begin at any time and it goes away

Last edited Thu Apr 3, 2014, 08:20 AM - Edit history (1)

Including AFTER a person has bought a weapon and/or AFTER a person has permit to carry...if that's needed (in WI open carry doesn't require a permit while conceal carry does).

About 6 1/2% of the US population experiences depression each per year. You can see from the CDC graphic below that it has a somewhat higher incidence in Americans 40-60.



According to Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA http://psychopathology.wiki.westga.edu/file/view/JAMA-2003-Kessler-3095-105.pdf/229631240/JAMA-2003-Kessler-3095-105.pdf)

About 50% of people who get depression suffer 'severe' or 'very severe depression. The average duration of the depression is about 16 weeks, and that's important, people get over depression.

Approx. half of people with with depression ever get diagnosed. For the purposes of the NATIONAL INSTANT CRIMINAL BACKGROUND CHECK, that' a problem. Each year about 10 million people with depression would be MISSED. And the majority of the ~10 million people that would be entered...would no longer be depressed in 3 months. Do we just keep people on the system because "Well, hell they could get depressed again?"

The life-time risk of depression in the US is slightly above 16%. You're talking about wanting to put the names of 56 million people in a criminal database, NOT because they've done something criminal, but because they've suffered from the most common mental illness. People misunderstand mental illness and think most mentally ill people are dangerous to self or others. That's not true.

BUT you can't actually get 56 million people's names on record because more than half of the people who might be reported based on FBI surveillance of patient medical or prescription medication never seek clinical help. They don't have records subject to surveillance.

The greatest risk of gun violence among the depressed is suicide. About 60% of gun deaths in the US are suicides, and depending on what time reference you choose it is about 16000 deaths per year. It is certainly a problem. But it's uncertain that adding the depressed to NICS would really solve the problem. Creating a database of 40 million depressed persons costs a lot of money to produce a lot of data that is not going to be very predictive of future gun violence. Each person in the database would have a per capita risk of gun suicide of 0.00045 per year. The American Psychological Association says they have no way of telling WHICH people with diagnosed mental illness will commit acts of violence.

In the end it's a lot of money for the database, some serious invasion of private medical histories, for dubious rationales, yielding very little predictive value.

Although it's still argued, suicide has been considered an impulsive act. And as shown by reductions in gun suicide rate when waiting periods are imposed, the impulsiveness can be beaten by delaying delivery of a handgun. Impulsiveness passes in a very short time. Depression typically resolves in several months (notwithstanding some cases of depression last more than 12 months).

Considering the weaknesses of the database both in coverage and predictive value, it seems that WAITING PERIODS remain one of the best methods for reducing gun suicides in the depressed.