The City Life May Not be So Dangerous

Despite what your grandma's learned from watching Law and Order, living in an urban area isn't less safe than a rural one. In fact, according to a recent study, it may be more dangerous.

According to researchers from the American College of Emergency Physicians, they analyzed all 3,141 of the counties in the United States during a 7-year period, yielding data on nearly 1.3 million "injury deaths."

The study notes that many cities have seen a decline in populations as residents have moved to other areas in the hopes of finding safer places to live. No studies have previously been completed on the injury risk between urban and rural areas.

Findings showed that the risk of injury death was 22 percent higher in rural counties than in urban ones. For instance, motor vehicle crashes led to 28 deaths for every 100,000 people in rural areas, versus only 11 deaths per 100,000 urban areas. And firearm related death rates were higher in rural areas for children and people over 45 years of age, but for 22- to 44-year-olds, the risk was higher in urban areas.

"Cars, guns and drugs are the unholy trinity causing the majority of injury deaths in the US. Although the risk of homicide is higher in big cities, the risk of unintentional injury death is 40 percent higher in the most rural areas than in most urban," said lead study author, Dr. Sage Myers from the University of Pennsylvania, via Medical News Today. "And overall, the rate of unintentional injury dwarfs the risk of homicide, with the rate of unintentional injury more than 15 times that of homicide among the entire population.That has important implications about staffing of emergency departments and trauma care systems in rural areas, which tend to be underserved as it is."

The findings show a clear need for more safety services in rural areas and a great improvement for emergency care, according to researchers.

More regarding the study can be found in the Annals of Emergency Medicine.