Death rate from guns same for children in the most populous urban counties and the most rural

Urban areas have a reputation for gun deaths, but children in the most rural U.S. counties are as likely to die from gunfire as those in the largest cities, says a new study published today in the journal Pediatrics. "Murders involving firearms are more common among city youth," Carla K. Johnson of The Associated Press reports. "But gun suicides and accidental fatal shootings level the score: They are more common among rural kids." The researchers analyzed data from 24,000 gun-related deaths among people under 20 from 1999 through 2006.

"This debunks the myth that firearm death is a big-city problem," the study's lead author, Dr. Michael Nance of Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, told AP. "This is everybody's problem." Researchers sorted the data by county and compared rates in the most urban counties, those with populations of 1 million or more, and the most rural, those with towns of fewer than 2,500 people, and found essentially the same rate, around four deaths per 100,000 children. Previous analysis found similar rural-urban gun death patterns among adults, AP reports. (Read more)