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There was just today an article in the Wall Street Journal... A trauma center in Baltimore (I think) has a 4% mortality rate for Gun Shot Wounds (GSW), and that includes patients brought in who are DOA. Bottom line, a person with a gunshot wound who enters a trauma center with a pulse has a very good chance of surviving.
That is the good news. The bad news is that the point of the article is that there has been a decline in the homicide rate over the last umpteen years... but it is possible or even likely that the reason for the decline is due to improvements in hospital treatments for GSW and stabbings. It is possible that people are shooting and stabbing each other as much as they ever did, perhaps more so... but since hospitals have gotten so much better at keeping people alive, it leads to a lower homicide rate.... if the victim does not die, it is not a homicide.
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