
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, July 7, 1990                   TAG: 9007070085
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: ATLANTA                                LENGTH: Short

CRASHES LEADING KILLER OF KIDS

Injuries are the top killers of young people in this country, claiming more than 20,000 lives a year. But not all are car crashes or swimming mishaps; nearly 3,000 are homicides.

The agency said that 2,877 Americans younger than 20 died from homicide in the latest year for which complete statistics are available, 1986. Nearly two-thirds were older teen-agers, but 23 percent - 660 in all - were younger than 5.

Homicides accounted for nearly 13 percent of the 22,411 fatal injuries to children in 1986, second only to motor vehicle accidents, the CDC said.

Sixty-eight percent of the young homicides occurred among males, and rates for black children were about five times higher than for white children.

Motor vehicle crashes killed 10,535 people younger than 20 in 1986. CDC researchers estimate that between 15 percent and 30 percent of those deaths were associated with alcohol.

Suicide was the third leading cause of childhood fatal injuries, accounting for 2,151 young people's deaths in 1986. Males accounted for 80 percent, and the suicide rate was roughly twice as high for white youths as for blacks.

Drowning, the fourth leading cause of childhood fatal injuries, killed 2,062 youths; it was the most common injurious cause of death among children younger than 5 and among male teens 15-19.

by CNB