Photo credit: Tima Miroshnichenko
by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalition
A 2020 study from the National Institute for Deafness and Other Communication Disorders found that having fired 1,000 rounds or more was associated with hearing loss in American adults. This means the use of silencers can help hunters and target shooters preserve their hearing.
The Reload site recently announced that the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery endorsed the use of silencers to prevent hearing loss. Silencers, technically called sound suppressors, reduce muzzle blast noise by 30 decibels. Here is the AAO-HNS policy statement.
Anything that prevents noise-induced hearing loss is good for hearing. Unfortunately, guns are not good for society. Gun silencers may protect the hearing of gun shooters, but guns may endanger others. According to the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, gun deaths in the United States are the highest in the industrialized world. And, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were over 46,000 gun deaths in the United States in 2023. That’s more than the 40,000 Americans killed in motor vehicle crashes that year. I think government policies should be evidence based, and protect as many Americans as possible. While preventing noise-induced hearing loss is important, protecting human life is more important.
In the US, firearm homicides occur at a stunning rate of 4.52 per 100,000 people, compared with 0.34 in Sweden, 0.06 in Germany and 0.01 in the United Kingdom. The American Medical Association declared gun violence to be a public health emergency in 2016 and continues to advocate prevention of gun violence and increased gun safety. The American Academy of Pediatrics reports that in the United States, firearm deaths are now the leading cause of death in children, adolescents and young adults from birth to age 24.
Shootings are such a problem that many cities, including New York City, Chicago and Birmingham, have installed gunshot detection systems to decrease police and ambulance response time to shootings. Firearms silencers — which are illegal in eight states — may interfere with these detection systems.
Perhaps silencers could be kept at shooting ranges for use in target shooting practice in order to prevent noise-induced hearing loss. But from a broader public policy perspective, I think all state and local governments should join the eight states already prohibiting the public to own them.
