The following statistics are for 2010 and provide some perspective.
All unintentional injury deaths
• Number of deaths: 120,859
Unintentional fall deaths• Number of deaths: 26,009
Motor vehicle traffic deaths
• Number of deaths: 33,687
Unintentional poisoning deaths
• Number of deaths: 33,041
Centers for disease control and prevention
“While motor-vehicle deaths dropped 22 percent from 2005 to 2010, gun fatalities are rising again after a low point in 2000, according to the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Shooting deaths in 2015 will probably rise to almost 33,000, and those related to autos will decline to about 32,000, based on the 10-year average trend.” … Bloomberg
Most pertinent, in 2012 there were 14,748 reported murders, 40 per day.
Three people are killed and scores seriously injured by what likely was a deranged bomber in Boston and for days the media devotes itself to details of the investigation. CNN makes a fool of itself in a rush to report an arrest that had not occurred. During a seven hour drive form West Virginia yesterday and listening to Serius XM radio with its numerous current event channels , NewsLanc’s publisher could rarely find a news or talk show about any other subject.
Three people being killed and scores of others seriously injured is news. But at what point does the time devoted to such occurrences by the media transition into show business and crowd out reporting on other important matters concerning the wellbeing of the nation? Has a tragedy at the marathon become a media circus?
Representatives of the media would answer they are simply providing the public with what the public wants. So shame on us too.
If my arithmetic is correct we have a .039% chance of unintentional death and a .01% chance from dying via firearm. Now, if we include the number of firearm deaths inflicted because of gang related drug violence among rival gangs, I’m sure the .01% number drops significantly. Newslanc is right. We need objective reporting not subjective hype.