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March 11, 2025
Raising Awareness: AFSP and NSSF Unite to Address Firearm-Related Suicide
Ryan Price, Director of Special Projects at the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP), talks with SHOT Show TV about how the AFSP works with NSSF to raise awareness for firearm-related suicide.
A shocking stat I read said 50 percent of gun-related deaths are from suicide. That’s a staggering number.
It is, and that’s why we’re here at SHOT Show to talk about some of the work that we’re doing. We’ve worked with NSSF since 2017 on some materials for firearm owners because, within the industry amongst firearm owners, suicide prevention has not really been a topic historically. And yeah, over the last 20 years, out of all gun deaths, suicide accounts for 60 percent.
What was the announcement you made at SHOT Show?
We have launched this suicide prevention toolkit for firearms instructors. It’s a short 10-slide deck that’s free for any firearms instructor to download, and what we’re hoping is instructors will utilize it in the courses that they’re teaching. If you’ve taken a firearms course, you know safety is, if not the whole topic, much of it, and so we want to encourage that conversation to include suicide prevention. In the US, about 60 percent of gun owners report having received formal training in firearm safety and we want to add suicide prevention to that.
What type of person does this presentation address?
For people in households, oftentimes especially for kids, if they die by suicide, they’re using a parent or guardian’s firearm. As a firearm owner and as a responsible adult, you need to know what to look for in other people in your household, whether it’s kids or grandkids, family members, spouses and to know what to do about it. Also, people need to know about suicide prevention, the warning signs and getting help for mental health so that if they’re the one struggling, they can make that decision voluntarily to do some kind of action that puts time and distance between them and the firearm.
Do you also partner with the VA on veteran suicide prevention?
We do. It’s all a somewhat coordinated effort in order to reach people and the message is the same really for anyone, which is that suicide crises are often temporary. When someone is in a crisis and thinking about suicide, if they don’t have access to the method they’re thinking about, in our case of firearm, then they’re not going to look for another method to die by suicide or to attempt suicide. So it’s sort of a common myth where people will think, well, you know, if we do something and prevent them from accessing a gun, they’re going to find somewhere else and it’s just not true. The messaging that we have for general audiences, including veterans, the VA with veteran audiences, we’re just trying to reach firearm owners. I think the difference with veterans is that in the general population, we see that firearms are involved in about 50 percent of all suicides. In the veteran population, it’s 75 percent. So, veterans utilize a firearm to attempt suicide and ultimately die by suicide, more than non-veterans.
Is making sure the gun is locked up a part of the toolkit?
We provide some strategies that firearm owners can keep in mind, which is lock, limit or temporarily remove. There’s sort of a sequential order that you can implement strategies to put more time and distance between a person who might be suicidal and a firearm. It’s really important to know that most people that survive a suicide attempt don’t go on to die by suicide or even attempt suicide later in life. But because firearms are almost always lethal, people don’t get that second chance. We want to provide firearm owners with the tools and the information so that they can make an informed decision about how they’re storing their firearms, especially related to suicide prevention.
Does this toolkit go out to gun training centers all over the country at this point?
Yeah, any firearm instructor is free to download them. They can just visit afsp.org/firearmsinstructors. It’s a free download and they can just plug it right into their normal training protocol. They can even add their logo and it’s totally scripted and so they don’t have to be an expert either.
You may also be interested in:
NSSF and VA combat Veteran Suicide Through Ongoing Partnership
NSSF’s ‘Gun Storage Check Week’ to Run Sept. 1-7 During National Suicide Prevention Month
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