American

One appalling result of America's fixation with firearms was disclosed last week. A study by the National Center for Health Statistics found that 3,392 children ages 1 through 19 were killed in homicides, suicides and accidents with guns in 1987, accounting for 11% of deaths in that age group. No nation comes close to the U.S. in such fatalities. In 1985 not a single teenage male was the victim of gun-related homicide in England or Sweden.

The most frequent victims of the U.S. carnage were black males ages 15 to 19: 49.2 per 100,000 in this group died in 1987 from the homicidal use of guns. Among whites, the rate was 5.1 per 100,000. Said Health and Human Services Secretary Louis Sullivan: "We are losing our youth increasingly to injury and violence."