FRIDAY, Aug. 23, 2024 (HealthDay News) — Red flag laws are an effective suicide prevention tool, a new study shows.

About one life was saved when an extreme risk protection order (ERPO) kept firearms away from a person in trouble, researchers reported August 20 in the Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and Law.

“This analysis provides important information to demonstrate that ERPOs can save lives,” said lead researcher Jeffrey Swanson, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Duke University School of Medicine in Durham, North Carolina.

“These laws do not impinge on the right of private gun ownership for anyone who is non-dangerous and law-abiding, and they are widely supported by people across the political spectrum,” Swanson added in a Duke press release.

Judges issue ERPOs when they conclude a person poses an imminent danger to themselves or others, researchers explain in background information. The person’s guns are temporarily taken away.

Laws allowing ERPOs currently exist in 21 states and the District of Columbia.

For the study, researchers analyzed ERPOs issued against nearly 4,600 people in California, Connecticut, Maryland and Washington. They used death records to determine whether these people had committed suicide.

Guns are by far the deadliest method of suicide, with a fatality rate of 90%, researchers say. With all other methods of suicide, only about 10% of people who attempt suicide actually die.

The researchers’ analysis found that ERPOs likely helped prevent about 269 suicides — one life for every 17 times such an order is issued.

The results showed that more states would benefit from red flag laws and that they should be used more frequently to protect people from themselves, Swanson said.

“Even if we reduce many of the things that motivate people to engage in violent behavior, we still live in a society where people have easy access to technologies designed to kill efficiently,” Swanson said. “Increasing access to firearms for people at risk of harming themselves or others is an evidence-based approach that can save lives.”

More information

RAND Corp. has additional information on extreme risk protection orders.

SOURCE: Duke University, press release, August 20, 2024