Illinois has a new tool to monitor violent deaths and non-fatal firearm violence at the county level to hopefully better prevent and reduce violence in the state.
The dashboard, launched Jan. 21 by the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH), is presented in two parts: Illinois Firearm Injury Rates and Illinois Violent Deaths. It is intended to provide detailed information at the county level about these incidents, including the types of incidents (e.g., homicide, suicide, etc.), weapon type and victim's residence, broken down by county.
Scientists at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine operate the Illinois Violent Death Reporting System (IVDRS), which supplies the violent death and circumstances data to the dashboard, including victim and suspect demographics, circumstances leading up to and including the fatal injury, and toxicology and autopsy results. Data for deaths comes from death certificates, coroner/medical examiner, law enforcement, toxicology and autopsy reports. It is the most comprehensive data source of on these types of deaths.
"We need data to identify public health problems so we can develop, scale and evaluate interventions to reduce violence," said Maryann Mason, associate professor of emergency medicine at Feinberg. "This dashboard puts critical data in the hands of people who can make a difference."
The goal of the dashboard is to inform data-driven prevention and intervention efforts to reduce violent deaths and firearm injuries in Illinois. The dashboard also is available as a resource for journalists reporting on violence and death trends in the state.
While Minnesota and Michigan have similar dashboards tracking violent deaths, the Illinois dashboard is the first of its kind to gather comprehensive data about both violent deaths and non-fatal firearm injuries.
"Firearm violence is a public health crisis that requires public health solutions," said IDPH Director Dr. Sameer Vohra. "Modernizing how we gather and use data is critical to finding holistic solutions that address firearm violence in a comprehensive way. We look forward to partnering with our statewide and local leaders to use this dashboard to create data-driven policies and plans that make our communities safer and healthier."
The data gathered for the dashboard informs on violent death and firearm injury trends in Illinois:
- Rates of suicide and homicide among women in Illinois increased in recent years. Suicides increased from 172 in 2015 to 325 in 2022. Homicides increased from 76 in 2015 to 211 in 2022.
- Men are far more likely than women to be victims of violent deaths and non-fatal firearms injuries in Illinois. The non-fatal firearm injury rate for men was 261.2 per 100,000 ED visits, compared to 37.2 for women.
- Suicide, unintentional firearm and law enforcement intervention death rates have been relatively flat in Illinois from 2015-2022, while homicide rates spiked in 2020 and 2021 (a trend that was also observed nationwide).
- Firearms were used in 84% of homicide deaths, 36% of suicide deaths and 57% of all violent deaths among those under 18 years of age between 2015-2022.
- The City of Chicago had the highest rate of non-fatal firearms injury, with more than 350 reported out of every 100,000 ER visits.
- The most common age range to sustain a non-fatal firearm injury was 20-to-29-year-olds, followed by 10-to-19-year-olds. Firearm-related violent deaths were highest among 20-to-29-year-olds.
- Firearms violence disproportionately impacts communities of color. Black Illinoisans are more than 10 times as likely to sustain a non-fatal firearm injury compared to white residents. Black Illinoisans account for more than 55% of firearm fatalities in the state while making up only 12.4% of Illinois' population.
IDPH hopes to expand the technology to track other significant incidents that affect public wellbeing, such as sexual assault.
The Dashboard was created by Understory Consulting, a research and policy consulting firm that works on issues related to human rights, social justice and equity. The dashboard development was funded through support from The Joyce Foundation, a Chicago-based private, nonpartisan philanthropic organization that invests in public policies and strategies to advance racial equity and economic mobility in Illinois and other states in the Great Lakes Region. Data for the dashboard are sourced from two public health surveillance systems funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
