Treating gun crime like disease shows results

[Drizzt]

Treating gun crime like disease shows results

August 21, 2002

BY FRANK MAIN
CRIME REPORTER

In the late 1980s, Dr. Gary Slutkin was at the forefront of the fight against AIDS in Africa. He later worked to eradicate a tuberculosis outbreak in San Francisco. Now he's attacking gun crime in Chicago as a disease.

In 1995, Slutkin founded the Chicago Project for Violence Prevention, which aims to prevent shootings in 10 neighborhoods. He said its strategy--declaring neighborhoods "CeaseFire" zones and putting outreach workers in the violence-plagued areas--works.

"We're changing the thought process that killing is OK," he said.

Slutkin, a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said shootings have dropped between 30 percent and 67 percent in the first neighborhoods with CeaseFire zones.

In part of West Garfield Park, shootings fell from 43 in 1999 to 14 for each of the last two years.

The biggest change in the first six months of 2002 was in part of West Humboldt Park, which had 13 shootings compared with 37 in the same period last year.

CeaseFire works like programs that battle AIDS and other epidemics, Slutkin said. Outreach workers are recruited from the targeted population; a massive public education campaign is launched, and the focus is on a single problem--shootings. Neighborhoods have been blanketed with CeaseFire literature, which warns of stiff jail terms for gun crimes and gives program phone numbers.

Outreach workers, some of them ex-gang members, meet with people on the streets, day and night, urging them to call when they need help to prevent a shooting.

Tio Hardiman, a CeaseFire community coordinator, said a 13-year-old girl was shot and wounded in June in the Austin neighborhood. People were talking about retaliation. "We actively kept more shootings from happening," he said.

About two weeks ago CeaseFire workers heard of a plot to rob a man of his $30,000 chain. They foiled the holdup, Hardiman said.

CeaseFire workers help crime victims with funeral services or relocation. They even appear in court on behalf of defendants.

"We have a case where a guy got probation--instead of 11 years," said Norman Livingston Kerr, director of CeaseFire. "He was on a positive track."

One of the biggest drops in shootings was in the West Side's 11th police district.

"Eleven used to lead the pack," said James Maurer, chief of patrol. "But now, 11 doesn't have any of the 20 worst police beats in the city. [CeaseFire] is contributing greatly to this."

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) helped secure $450,000 in federal funds for the group for fiscal year 2003 on top of $750,000 in 2002.

"It is a really comprehensive approach to deal with the violence in the community," said Durbin, who plans to speak about the program today in Logan Square.


http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/...s-cease21.html

A $30,000 chain? Was it diamond encrusted?

[longeyes]

From what I can see gun ownership itself is increasingly being viewed as a social disease. Public safety and health concerns tend to trump freedom where consumerism trumps the Constitution.

[shootist2121]

This to me is anger management...Something most of us got as children and young adults..If it stops senseless shootings and killing , more power to it..It says nothing about taking thier rights away, or self-defense is wrong..It appears on what little I read and see that it's about finding a better way of dealing with anger.

Just my two cents.

Be safe all

[Blackhawk]

Good for them. But they're not "treating gun crime" as much as they're treating the sick culture that accepts gun crime as a social solution to piddling problems.

There are already ways to treat sick cultures, but they require enforcement of laws along with swift, sure, and severe punishment for violators. Since that doesn't happen when the cards are stacked against it, the "Ceasefire" efforts are better than nothing.

[Chris W]

Longeyes, I disagree. The way this program is described here (however it may look in the real world), it's focused on a *behavior*, not a technology, as the problem. "Shootings", not 'guns', constitute the problem this program is focused on--and if it's effective, wouldn't that be a GOOD thing for guns and gun owners? You could look at it almost as a kind of 'gun safety education program' coming from the unexpected quarter of a university; and the main gun-safety thrust is, "don't shoot someone 'cause they piss you off." Now if a community is troubled enough to need to hear that kind of message, it seems worth publicizing (especially if the alternative message is, "you can't be trusted with guns"). Wha'dy'all think?

CW

[Mikul]

Neighborhoods have been blanketed with CeaseFire literature, which warns of stiff jail terms for gun crimes and gives program phone numbers.

or not

We have a case where a guy got probation--instead of 11 years

[GSB]

Treating gun crime like a disease would mean the following: you identify the pathogen (criminals) and ruthlessly attack that pathogen with agents inimical to its survival. When the pathogen is knocked back to low levels, you go on as aggressive a maintenance regime as necessary to keep a lid on the sucker.

What we have now, instead, is a system that tries to get us to coddle the pathogen, understand the environmental reasons for its pain, and instructs us on how best to coexist with it and treat it with a "compassionate" course of therapy.

[labgrade]

Somehow I'm skeptical about the claims touted - call me cynical.

Sounds like the shootings are a sympton, certainly not the cause.

Boost your imune system & give the bugs a goodly vaccination of some high-speed varmit repellent.

[Futo Inu]

Well said, labgrade. Nothing wrong with treating "gun crime" as a disease, IF you're really going to do that, as GSB decribes. Problem is, CDC and many docs are treating "guns" and "gun owners" as a disease. Important to not get the 2 confused. Sounds like, on balance, they're doing good work, but foiling robberies is police work, pure and simple. OK, fine, if they want to do the work of police, more power to them. But how much are the actual police getting paid to do this already, and why aren't they doing it satisfactorily? Getting people to change their eye-for-an-eye views is a good thing. An even better thing would be to arm the disarmed population.

[Torquemada]

One of the biggest drops in shootings was in the West Side's 11th police district.

Or not

In the beginning, two police districts in Chicago will receive special attention. They are the 11th District (known as the Harrison District) and the 15th District (Austin District), which have the highest incidence of crimes with guns.

Or this:2002 year-to-date excerpts:
Chicago police said the incidence of the most violent crime is down slightly for opening four months of the year. With 163 homicides during the first third of the year, there are two fewer murders in 2002 than in 2001.

A high murder count isn't the only thing shared by the south side's 7th District and the west side's 11th District. Both also feature concentrated poverty, joblessness, gang activity and drug peddling.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So a drop of two overall is a "significant decrease." Or there's still about the same amount of homicides but CeaseFire has driven them into other neighborhoods.

On another note, the "value" of a human life is $125,000 ($750k grant/4 month period/2 fewer homicides). If Durbin would have given CeaseFire $20,375,000 ALL homicides would have been prevented this year!:barf: :barf: :barf:

[Skibane]

About two weeks ago CeaseFire workers heard of a plot to rob a man of his $30,000 chain. They foiled the holdup, Hardiman said.

I'm not sure that preventing one thug from robbing another one qualifies as a good use of resources...

[OJ]

Public Health doctors tell us we should regard guns as “viruses” to be eradicated because exposure of persons to this “virus” causes them to contract the disease of “gun violence” that they are powerless to resist. Thus, guns are a public health problem.

Viruses cause hepatitis and AIDS and having close relationships with those harboring these viruses gives one significant risk of catching those diseases. This is clearly a public health problem.

I have had close relationships with guns for more than sixty-five years but have never felt like committing “gun violence.” My wife and I have had a close relationship for twenty years and she is not afflicted either.

Astonishingly, public health doctors seem to have ignored the most effective tool ever devised to eradicate viruses-IMMUNIZATION. We inject a less powerful variant of viruses into persons and their bodies develop immunity to the more powerful virus. Using this principle, we could require every person to acquire a less powerful gun such as a .22 caliber single shot rifle. With time, their bodies would develop immunity so they could all safely handle and shoot more powerful guns such as handguns, semiautomatics, and even “assault rifles” without fear of developing the dreaded “gun violence” disease.

It seems to have worked for me.

Yours truly,



O J KING, MD


Published in letters to the editor (Tell It To The Gazette) in the Gazette newspaper, Colorado Springs, Colorado, on October 17, 1999.

[benewton]

OJ
I do believe that you've got it.

Now, if you could just convince your peers, one more group of anti's would be converted, and then, perhaps, we could put this thing to bed.