First Amendment vs. Second Amendment

If you took your kid to the pediatrician and the doctor started asking you if you had guns and wanted to know how safely they were stored you might feel like this is a creeping assault on the second amendment. Pediatricians are doing this of their own free will for the safety of the children. There it is : "for the children."

This is not something they are doing by law. Again, by their own free will.

Florida passed a law banning doctors from doing this. Fortunately the U.S. District Court has struck down the law as unconstitutional since it violated the physician's right to free speech. I have to say I agree.

I worry about the initial asking of the question. I have no idea from the cited story or a few others I read if the doctor's are tracking the information. Also, since the story talks about doctors, plural, is this becoming an official policy among doctors or pediatricians?

Yes.

The American Academy of Pediatrics encourages doctors to talk about safety of ALL types. Doctors talks about car seats, pool safety, and gun safety. Louis St. Petery, MD, executive vice president of the Florida chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics had this to say about the policy:

We're not against guns, per se. What we're concerned about is proper storage and handling of firearms.

That is the official statement from the American Academy of Pediatrics. But what about the Doctors? The AAP did a study and released the results this past May. Here are a few stats from the study.

• Eighty-six percent of the pediatricians surveyed agree or strongly agree that gun-control legislation will help reduce the risks of injury or death among children and adolescents.
• Among those surveyed, 92 percent agree or strongly agree that pediatricians should support legislation to restrict possession or sale of handguns.
• Some 77 percent of the physicians surveyed agree or strongly agree that pediatricians should support legislation to ban possession or sale of handguns.
• Among those surveyed, 84 percent agree or strongly agree that pediatricians should, during routine intake screening, question parents about firearm ownership and storage.
• Some 66 percent of those surveyed agree or strongly agree that pediatricians should advise parents who own handguns to remove them from their homes.
• Only 12 percent of the pediatricians surveyed stated that they always identify families who keep firearms in their homes. Fifty percent of the physicians surveyed never identify which patients' families have firearms at home.

Did you catch that? That last little item? 12 percent always identify families who keep firearms in the home. Sounds like some doctors are keeping track.

Now I don't know what to think of the striking of the law.