As with everything liberal, facts are only useful when the help drive the agenda forward.
Malpractice by physicians, nurses and hospital staff is a health crisis that costs many more deaths than the criminal use of firearms.
Then there is abuse of OTC drugs.
A simple example:
Acetaminophen and the U.S. Acute Liver Failure Study Group: lowering the risks of hepatic failure.
Lee WM1.
Abstract
Acetaminophen overdose is the leading cause for calls to Poison Control Centers (>100,000/year) and accounts for more than 56,000 emergency room visits, 2,600 hospitalizations, and an estimated 458 deaths due to acute liver failure each year. Data from the U.S. Acute Liver Failure Study Group registry of more than 700 patients with acute liver failure across the United States implicates acetaminophen poisoning in nearly 50% of all acute liver failure in this country. Available in many single or combination products, acetaminophen produces more than 1 billion US dollars in annual sales for Tylenol products alone. It is heavily marketed for its safety compared to nonsteroidal analgesics. By enabling self-diagnosis and treatment of minor aches and pains, its benefits are said by the Food and Drug Administration to outweigh its risks. It still must be asked: Is this amount of injury and death really acceptable for an over-the-counter pain reliever?
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15239078
most of the acetaminophen/tylenol overdoses are suicide attempts...and a few are drunks who take six or seven for a hangover. And some cases of hepatic failure is blamed on tylenol just because the patient took it.
We once had three patients who had severe hepatitis within a week, all of whom had been in a local celebration. I begged the state public health department to check other hospitals for similar cases and check if there had been a toxic event but got nowhere because they had all taken tylenol, and that was blamed.