Homeland War Linked To Increased Risk Of Death From Weapons-Related Injuries For Croatian Children

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Main Category: Aid / Disasters
Also Included In: Pediatrics / Children's Health;  Public Health
Article Date: 08 Feb 2008 - 0:00 PDT

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A recent article in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine finds that the 1991 to 1995 Homeland War in Croatia led to an increase in weapon-related deaths of children during and five years after the end of the war.

The study, performed by Aida Mujkic of the University of Iowa and colleagues, first notes that most Croatian children were not exposed to explosives and firearms in their homes or communities from the end of World War II to the beginning of the Homeland War. "Unlike many countries, personal weapon ownership was not a custom in Croatia," write the authors. As the Homeland War, or Third Balkan War, moved into Croatian territory, citizens began buying grenades, firearms, and other black market weapons. Croatians also acquired weapons from former Yugoslav army barracks, after they left Croatia. With 371,684 weapons legally owned by Croatians in 2007, the population remained overly militarized.

Mujkic and colleagues studied Croatian children from birth through age 19 who died of weapon-related injuries between 1986 and 2005. Croatia's national vital statistics system provided information that included traumatic injury deaths and a specification regarding intent - homicide, suicide, or unintentional.

The researchers found that rates of homicide and suicide with weapons more than tripled during the war compared with the period before the war. There was also a six-fold increase in unintentional weapon-related deaths.

The authors note that "these increases persisted for five years following the end of the war and decreased more than five years after the war." Specifically, they report that the weapon-related suicide rate remained more than three times that of the pre-war period, and weapons-related deaths in the early postwar period remained more than twice as high as before the war. There were significant decreases in the number of homicide and unintentional injury deaths in the late post-war period, but suicide rates were the same as in the pre-war period. There was no change over the course of the study in the number of children who died from causes other than weapons.

Mujkic and colleagues conclude by calling for programs that focus on the prevention of weapon-related injuries to be "integrated into programs that assist countries in rebuilding after political unrest."

"The combination of psychological effects of war on children with an increased presence of weapons may present a particularly important area for prevention," the authors write.

Effect of War on Weapon-Related Deaths in Croatian Children and Youth
Aida Mujkic, Corinne Peek-Asa, Tracy Young, Urelija Rodin
Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, Volume 162, No. 2, pp. 140-144, February 2008
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Written by: Peter M Crosta
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