Posted on 02/21/2013 8:21:26 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
SALT LAKE CITY — The issue of gun safety has been on the minds of Americans recently as lawmakers around the country voice their opinion about gun control legislation. The American Academy of Pediatrics, however, is drawing criticism for encouraging pediatricians to talk to their young patients about gun safety.
While not a new policy, the AAP is re-emphasizing their position that states should pass the "strongest possible firearm regulations" and are encouraging pediatricians to act as a "powerful" line of defense when talking about firearm safety with their young patients and family.
Following the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, where 20 children and six adults were killed, the AAP posted advocating tips on their website, encouraging pediatricians to be involved in the talks of gun safety.
"The American Academy of Pediatrics offers its deepest sympathies to everyone affected by the school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut," the website states. "The AAP firmly believes that children deserve a safe environment in which to grow and learn. Many members have asked what they can do to help. As a pediatrician, you are in a unique and powerful position to advocate for children's health issues."
The AAP website encourages pediatricians to address the subject of gun safety as part of a routine checkup and to "ask about the presence of firearms in the home, and counsel parents who do keep guns to store them unloaded in a locked case, with the ammunition locked separately." Additionally, the pediatrician should "instruct parents to ask if there is a gun in the house before sending their children to play at a friends' home."
Although a normal practice for many pediatricians, they are not required to ask about firearms during routine checks. In support of the practice, President Barack Obama vowed to protect doctors' rights to ask.
However, many members of the Republican Party say pediatricians go too far when asking question about guns in the home.
"It's not their business," Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, told The Hill. "It's like asking, ‘Do people pray in your home? Do they voice opinions contrary to the (Obama) administration?' "
"Are they going to start asking if (patients) are Republicans or Democrats?" added Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz. "Asking questions that are none of the pediatricians' business is out of bounds."
Other Republicans, however, are fine with pediatricians talking about gun safety when addressing the health of a patient.
"Our pediatricians do a fabulous job," said Rep. Phil Gingrey, R-Ga, an OBGYN. "In the spirit of knowing that maybe there were guns in the home, to advise a parent or a legal guardian about gun safety, I think I understand."
While the overall subject of firearms remains controversial, Sen. John Barasso, R-WY, a former physician, said he hopes the discussion would include more talk about mental illnesses rather than gun control.
"There is no role, in my opinion, for the government to tell doctors what they should or should not ask the patients and the families," Barasso said on CNN's State of the Union with Candy Crowley. "I would really see a focus if they worked on the mental illness components with the pediatricians than what they have to or what they cannot do in talking to their patients."
In addition to speaking to patients and their families about gun safety, the AAP website encourages pediatricians to contact local media and the local school districts to provide expertise on the subject of firearms, mental health and school violence. The website also says to "reach out to your state legislators and members of Congress to advocate for improved gun safety legislation and funding for mental health services."
"The absence of guns in homes and communities is the most reliable and effective measure to prevent firearm-related injuries in children and adolescents," the AAP official policy states. "The AAP supports a number of specific measures to reduce the destructive effects of guns in the lives of children and adolescents, including the regulation of the manufacture, sale, purchase, ownership, and use of firearms; a ban assault weapons; and expanded regulations of handguns for civilian use. To prevent gun-related death and injuries, the AAP recommends that pediatricians provide firearm safety counseling to patients and their parents."
They never ask if you have a backyard swimming pool.
Far more children die in those.
I don’t take “instructions” from my children’s doctors. This is why I avoid pediatricians. We’ve only ever had one who was a really good guy.
“Sorry Doctor, we don’t discuss family security matters with anybody but family members.”
“And, by the way, do have a Law Enforcement Official’s Badge and a Warrant signed by a duly sworn Magistrate to ask those kind of questions of me and my family members?”
“Doctor, do you have any firearms in your home?”
So? Talk is cheap, what are they going to do about it?
“Co-sleeping” (or smothering your baby) is the # one killer of children in Milwaukee. They should remove the beds from all homes.
I notice there’s never any mention of gangbangers, black on black shootings, the Chicago/Detroit murder epidemic, etc.
What about those children’s safety?
Oh, that’s right, ridding ourselves of ‘gun violence’ is only a strawman argument to hide the real agenda, which is tyranny.
Guns are bad, SSRIs, and amphetamines are much better.
Obamacare restricts doctors’ ability to ask patients about guns .
http://conservativebyte.com/2012/12/obamacare-restricts-doctors-ability-to-ask-patients-about-guns/
Expertise? On the subject of firearms? Not usually.
They know that when they ask a grown person about whether or not they own guns, they will be told it’s none of their damned business.
So they will ask the children—does your daddy have a gun? Is it locked up? Do you know where he keeps his ammunition? and the poor kid will give you up without knowing what he/she is doing.
Just tell your kid it’s a game. The doctor will ask if Daddy has any guns. The correct answer is to say, “No,” and then whisper softly, “But we have Jews hiding in the attic!”
Regulate homosexuality.
More die form it than guns by a huge factor.
“I don’t talk about my personal security requirements with non-family members.”
and then i’d start asking the most intimate questions i can think of to my doctor, and start writing down the answers.
You don’t need a badge and warrant to ask questions.
These left wing quacks have their nerve.
The mistakes made by doctors kill as many as 200,000 people a year, and they have the gall to lecture patients about firearms and gun safety?
Where do they get their so-called expertise to “advise” on the storage and handling of firearms?
Parents should accompany their kids in the exam rooms. Never leave your kids alone with these agenda-driven leftists.
Doctors are welcome to ask my kids anything they want. And I am free to walk out, never return, and steer other decent Americans away from that physician. I will not deal with liberals when there is a choice, and there is almost always a choice. So long as they want me taxed into poverty and defenseless, I will treat them as the traitors they are.
The Doctor better have one of each if he’s asking me questions I view are an invasion of my privacy with regard to my Fourth Amendment Constitutional Right.
He wants to press the issue, I’ll sue he ass. I hope his malpractice insurance is up to date.
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