In article <qa1RTc1w165w@aroga.wimsey.com> orion@aroga.wimsey.com (Orion) writes:
> ljuno@dnbf01.dev.cdx.mot.com (Lance Juno) writes:
> > I imagine that the desire to remove guns, with the statistical chance you
> > show, is largely due to the fact that being shot is probably, IMHO, one of
> > the most vulgar ways of one person to assault another person.
> Wrong...being stabbed is.
> Statscan tells us that of all violent assaults that are *not*
> immediately fatal your odds of survival are better if you are shot rather
> than stabbed (some people aren't even immediately aware that they *have*
> been shot!). Knife wounds tend to be large, ugly and tough to repair ass
> opposed to neat little bullet entry wounds, depending on location,
> calibre and other factors..
Perhaps you could tell us more about what your source says and how it
came to that conclusion.
I looked in Medline for studies on gun shot and stab wound mortality
and it turned up dozens. There was a consistent pattern across
different countries and wound locations -- gunshot wounds were far
more lethal. For example a study in The Journal of Trauma (36:4
pp516-524) looked at all injury admissions to a Seattle hospital over
a six year period. The mortality rate for gunshot wounds was 22%
while that for stab wounds was 4%. Even among patients that survived,
gunshot wounds were more serious -- the mean cost of treatment for
these patients was more than twice that for stab wounds.
Repairing a large entry wound (like from a knife) or a small entry
wound (like from a bullet) is not very difficult in either case. What
is difficult is repairing vital organs. Large low-velocity things
like knives tend to push them out the way, while small high-velocity
things like bullets plow right into them.
Tim