As Military Suicides Rise, Focus Is on Private Weapons [View all]
Source: new york times
With nearly half of all suicides in the military having been committed with privately owned firearms, the Pentagon and Congress are moving to establish policies intended to separate at-risk service members from their personal weapons.
Defense Department officials are developing a suicide prevention campaign that will encourage friends and families of potentially suicidal service members to safely store or voluntarily remove personal firearms from their homes.
“This is not about authoritarian regulation,” said Dr. Jonathan Woodson, the assistant secretary of defense for health affairs. “It is about the spouse understanding warning signs and, if there are firearms in the home, responsibly separating the individual at risk from the firearm.”
Dr. Woodson, who declined to provide details, said the campaign would also include measures to encourage service members, their friends and their relatives to remove possibly dangerous prescription drugs from the homes of potentially suicidal troops.
Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/08/us/with-military-suicides-rising-new-policies-take-shape.html?_r=1&
The News here is the Pentagon and Congress are actually starting to address the problem... And get rid of am obviously destructive law prohibiting the discussion of firearms.
What I would like to know is what Congressmen helped put in place in 2011, this stupid law that prevents counselors from discussing guns with suicidal troops? Why would the nra and Congress even care about that? I would also like to know if the suicide rate has increased since these 2011 don't ask policies have been in place, and if they have? Who's dumb idea was it in the first place?
I will start looking into this further, if anybody has any additional info, please post, thanks
Article on repealing from 2011: http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/nra-blocked-effort-prevent-military-s
Article about Congress inaction, also from 2011: http://thinkprogress.org/security/2011/11/07/362689/nra-military-suicides/
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