I was interviewed for this article in the 2/10/13 Norfolk Virginian-Pilot. Other doctors interviewed for the article insist that they ask their patients about their guns only out of concern for gun safety. But, as I point out in the article, firearm safety is not taught in medical school or residency. But gun control activism certainly is. Pediatricians, internal medicine specialists, family doctors, and even general surgeons get at least some minimum exposure to the anti-gun rights policies of their national specialty societies, which are fed to them by their teachers. Those teachers may themselves be prejudiced against gun-owning patients, or they may just go along with their colleagues.
When I was active in the California Medical Association (CMA), the state affiliate of the AMA, I introduced a resolution that the CMA would officially endorse the gun safety slogan for kids, “If you see a gun, Stop, Don’t touch, Leave the area, Tell an adult.” The CMA governing body agreed to adopt the resolution only if it didn’t mention where the slogan came from—the National Rifle Association’s popular Eddie Eagle GunSafe® program for children.
If doctors and their national medical societies were truly interested in promoting gun safety, you’d think they would partner with the proven experts in gun safety education—the NRA, the NRA’s many state affiliate gun owner associations, the National Shooting Sports Foundation, and countless local youth gun clubs. But instead they have consistently refused to work with them. This exposes these doctors for what they are—meddling, politically motivated do-gooders who use their patients’ trust to try to turn them against gun ownership.
—Timothy Wheeler, MD is director of Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership, a project of the Second Amendment Foundation.