Firearm Deaths in the Great Lakes Region

In 2019 there were over 39,700 deaths caused by firearm incidents in the United States. That put the 2019 firearms death rate at about 12.1 deaths per 100,000 population.  By comparison, twenty years earlier, in 1999, the national firearms death rate was about 15% lower at 10.3 deaths per 100,000 population.  While the national firearms death rate surged between 1999 and 2019, in the Great Lakes region the increase in the death rate was more severe.  From a region where the firearms death rate was nearly 6% below the national average in 1999, by 2019 the Great Lakes region had a firearms death rate that was on par with the national average.  The surge in the firearms death rate from 1999 to 2019 was particularly severe in Ohio.  A closer examination of data from the National Center for Health Statistics, a unit of the CDC, reveals the following about firearm deaths in the Great Lakes region:

Firearm Deaths in the Great Lakes Region

State/Deaths	1999	2009	2019
IL	1,209	1,058	1,367
IN	680	735	958
MI	1,085	1,095	1,220
OH	939	991	1,578
WI	448	457	604
Region	4,361	4,336	5,727
U.S.	28,874	31,347	39,707
State/Death Rate*	1999	2009	2019
IL	9.8	8.3	10.8
IN	11.2	11.4	14.2
MI	11.0	11.1	12.2
OH	8.3	8.6	13.5
WI	8.4	8.1	10.4
Region	9.7	9.4	12.2
U.S.	10.3	10.2	12.1

(*) number of firearm-caused deaths per 100,000 population

Source: CDC Wonder. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics. Underlying Cause of Death 1999-2019 on CDC WONDER Online Database, released in 2020. Data are from the Multiple Cause of Death Files, 1999-2019, as compiled from data provided by the 57 vital statistics jurisdictions through the Vital Statistics Cooperative Program. Accessed on June 2, 2021