This letter was submitted in response to the column, “Further regulations needed on path to gun ownership,” which was published in the Sept. 9 edition of The Daily Reveille.
Take some time to imagine this: You’ve been graduated from LSU for some time now; you have your dream life and dream job. It’s a beautiful mid-October day, the Louisiana downpours have stopped, and there is no chance of rain all week. Your significant other noticed the leaky gutter last week and kindly asked you to go get the ladder and see if you could diagnose the problem. You reluctantly agree, you climb up the ladder, and in a tragic turn of events, it tips over — and now you’re dead… Sad, right?
Well, little do you know, this is what happens to normal Americans every day. In fact, unintentional fall deaths like the one above are the third most common way by which Americans die annually. This, of course, only comes after — I’m sure you guessed it — car accidents and unintentional poisonings. The point I’m trying to make here is that it is clear that we as a people aren’t responsible enough to have ladders, or even stairs above a step. By initiating a program that would reflect today’s stigma associated with gun reform, we as a nation can drastically reduce the number of unintentional fall deaths per year. Common sense ladder & stair laws are a way that compromise can arise for a touchy, not-so-political subject. Through this reform, people who believe that falling is a real danger will feel safe knowing that all ladder & stair owners are capable of using them responsibly, and those who are pro-ladder & stair can use them safely and effectively.
In order to purchase a ladder or have stairs built, the purchaser should have to undergo an extensive background check, multiple training sessions, and several formal exams in order to own and operate these deadly things. Some argue that something so American and essential shouldn’t be regulated, but people can easily be killed by using these deceitful tools of destruction. It is crucial that owners know the responsibility involved in doing anything that could potentially risk a fall.
By now, if you don’t think unintentional fall deaths aren’t severe, or you have a “It can’t happen to me” mentality, let this figure sink in: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported in 2013 that there were 30,208 unintentional fall deaths in the United States alone. To put that into perspective, the CDCP reported 505 deaths associated with “the accidental discharge of a firearm” and 11,208 deaths associated with “assault (homicide) by discharge of firearms” also in 2013. So for all of you non-math majors out there, you are roughly sixty times more likely to unintentionally fall and die than you are to be killed by the accidental discharge of a firearm, and three times more likely to unintentionally fall and die than you are to be killed by a firearm.
I realize that this may be a sensitive subject to some, but it needs to be talked about. We need to come together as a nation and push for common sense ladder and stair laws to reduce the number of fall deaths. There must be compromise so those who choose to use ladders or stairs can do so safely and lives can be saved.