Do you think it would be a good idea to ban gun sales to people with a mental health history?

Question

Anytime a person visits a psychiatrist, that psychiatrist could be required to put that patient on a list that would ban gun shops from selling guns to the patient.

I do think that healthy people should be able to buy guns. Otherwise, criminals will be able to buy guns on the black market while good people would be disarmed.

eeyore9939, actually, yes. Depression can turn dangerous. The VT shooter was clinically depressed.

Answer 1

You need to narrow it down a little.

If I see a pyschiatrist for grief counselling after a family membe dies, you're saying that disqualifies me from owning a gun?

Answer 2

I cant think of any place in the US that sells guns to crazy people with foreknowledge.

Look, the small town I live in and retired from the Police dept. is in northern Illinois. Not a big town but now considered the far south west suburbs of Chicago. My town isn't real busy with high crime but I was an Investigator/detective for all the homicides we have had in our town since 1983. ( four cases with 6 deaths. Not very many) One double homicide was with a firearm. Another double was by stabbing. One was by suffocation and one by kicking to death. So, just as a microcosm, our gun death rate ( all guns, not just handguns)is around 33 percent. Not near as bad as some would lead you to believe.

I have actually heard people quote that if there were no firearms, the murder rate for firearms would be 70% less. "Well, yeah, no sht". Get real facts and dont operate on emotion. Eliminate firearms and it will be ball bats, bombs, badazzes, etc. or any other method.

Answer 3

A person couldn't be put on such a list. It would violate HIPAA - Health Information Portability and Accountability Act.

Secondly - not all people with mental health issues have a predisposition to violence. Such a decision would be best left up to case law. Let the lawyers make that call.

Answer 4

Of course. Although I believe in our right and obligation to KEEP AND BEAR ARMS, I feel that there's got to be a way found to prevent the CRAZIES and CRIMINALS from getting them. But that's very difficult.
I have actually seen people who have had the right to bear arms legally taken away from them because they were convicted of crimes, go into a bar and get someone else to go buy them a gun !!! So how do we stop that???
I guess we all have to be vigilant and report things that are wrong, or look wrong, or seem wrong -- I was very young when that happened, but today i would go straight to the police and report it!!!
But the one thing that does work is, good people get, be, and stay armed!!! Our ancestors made sure we had that right in order that we could always protect ourselves as a people and that NO GOVERNMENT (even "our own") could come in and over-power us and enslave us!!!
Be VIGILANT & BE ARMED!!! You dont see criminals or crazies going into a police station and blowing people away, because they know police are ARMED !!!!!!

Answer 5

Its not a violation of HIPAA to disclose a patients mental state to an officer of the law. It is a good idea on the surface but you would have a hard time making a clear cut line to determine which patients would have their right to own firearms revoked. Probably a judge would need to rule on cases individually.

Answer 6

What do you mean by mental health history? Lots of people have visited a psychiatrist at one time or another. Depression is VERY common in the American population. For example, I have seen a doctor for depression, does that make me mentally unstable and likely to blow someone's head off?

Answer 7

I am against gun controll alws but I believe felons should not be able to purchase weapons and anyone who has ever been admitted to a mental hospital should not.

Sometimes people see a psychiatrist for marriage problems, stress, drug addiction etc. I dont think any of those are dangerous to a gun owner, if they are insane, have suicidal tendancies etc than they should NOT be allowed to purchase a weapon.

Answer 8

It was illegal until the Patient Confidentiality Act was passed a few years ago by the liberal Congress. Now no medical professional (including psychiatrists) can release any information on their patients without a court order.

Answer 9

That would make sense, but that wouldn't be legal. The information exchanged between a pychatrist and a client is confidential, releasing that info would be a violation of the HIPPA privacy act. But maybe that will change after this incident.

Answer 10

Yeah. It might stop Cheney from going hunting again.

The problem with that theory is it might prevent people from getting Psychiatric help they need. Beside some disorders wouldn't lead to murder or suicide. Where are you going to draw the line. I wouldn't want a serious schizophrenic from having a gun, but I wouldn't mind if Monk had one.