North Carolina Violent Death Reporting System
North Carolina
Injury £? Violence Hi
■ PREVENTION Branch
VIOLENT DEATH IN NORTH CAROLINA:
GASTON COUNTY INCIDENTS, 2008-2017
The North Carolina Violent Death Reporting System (NC-VDRS) is a CDC-funded statewide surveillance system that
collects detailed information on deaths that occur in North Carolina resulting from violence: homicide, suicide,
unintentional firearm deaths, legal intervention and deaths for which intent could not be determined. NC-VDRS is a
multi-source system that gathers information from death certificates, medical examiner reports and law
enforcement reports. The goal of this system is to aid researchers, legislators, and community interest groups in the
development of public health prevention strategies to reduce violent deaths. All deaths reported in this document
are based on location of occurrence rather than residence and, instead of a rate, the ocurrent ratio is reported. This
statistic is derived from the total number of violent deaths resulting from injuries in a specified geographic region
divided by the number of residents in this region. This document summarizes all fatal injuries from violence that
occurred in Gaston County for the years 2008-2017.
• For the years 2008-2017, there were 471
violent deaths from injuries sustained in
Gaston County. Of these 471 deaths, 463
were N.C. residents (98.3%) and 432 were
Gaston County residents (91.7%).
• There were 333 suicides (70.7%), 113
homicides (24.0%), four unintentional
firearm death (0.8%), 11 deaths from legal
intervention (2.3%) and 10 deaths of
100% undetermined intent (2.1%).
• In Gaston County, the suicide ratio was 3.3 times higher in males than females, and the homicide ratio was 1.9
times higher in males than in females.
• Patterns of suicide and homicide differed by race. Suicide victims were more likely to be Non-Hispanic white than
NH black. NH whites had 21.7 suicides per 100,000 population versus 5.0 suicides per 100,000 population in NH
blacks. All other racial groups combined had 10 suicides.
• In contrast, NH blacks had 13.7 homicides per 100,000 population as opposed to NH whites who had 3.7
homicides per 100,000 population. All other racial groups combined had eight homicides.
Manner of Death: Gaston County, N.C.:
NC-VDRS, 2008-2017*
- N.C. Division of Public Health - N.C. Violent Death Reporting System ~
Suicide I
Homicide I
Unintentional Firearm j 0.8%
Legal Intervention | 2.3%
Undetermined Intent
2.1%
70.7%
24.0%
0% 20%
‘Based on the county of injury occurrence.
40%
60%
80%
Manner of Death by Sex: Gaston
County, N.C.: NC-VDRS, 2008-2017*
" N.C. Division of Public Health - N.C. Violent Death Reporting System ~
1
e
0)
Manner of Death by Race: Gaston County,
N.C.: NC-VDRS, 2008-2017*
~ N.C Division of Public Health - N.C. Violent Death Reporting System ~
Manner of Death
■ NH white
■ NH black
Other
гасел
‘Based on the county of injury occurrence.
AOther race refers to Hispanics, American Indians, Asians, other races, and unspecified or unknown race.
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