If youre afraid of being shot, youre not alone, and your fears are, unfortunately, justified.
Guns kill almost 100 people in Americaevery single day.
Theyre messy, and they do a lot of damage you cant see.
Fair warning: the details below are fairly graphic and could be upsetting to some readers.
After the bullet tears into your flesh, fate rolls the dice.
A single gunshot in the arm or leg is more than enough to kill you if youre unlucky.
They cut through arteries and veins without alerting your muscles to the danger.
The other danger, of course, is organ damage that leads to organ failure.
Theres no knowing where a bullet will go once its been fired into you.
Its even possibleif youre shot many times at oncejust ask rapper50 Cent.
Its not about how many there are, its about where they go.
What about bulletproof materials likekevlar, you ask?
Youre not reallystoppingthe bullet per se, yourecatchingit, and that can still do plenty of damage.
Plus, kevlar is only useful against smaller caliber rounds like youd find in most handguns.
Rifle rounds will go right through it.
Youll need military-grade ceramic body armor for those.
Of course, many victims say the worst part isfeeling their own warm blood pour all over their body.
In short, its not fun.
After that, Narciso says you gotta try and stop the bleeding.
Remember, blood loss is what kills most people in this instance.
The best way to plug the hole is with some form ofocclusive dressing.
This can be petrolatum, gauze from a first aid kit or something improvised, like tape or plastic.
At this point, you have to wait and pray until emergency personnel arrive.
What are the odds youll actually die from a gunshot?
Pretty slim.Over the course of your lifetime, however, that number is closer to one in 6,905.
Also, those numbers are regarding deaths, and not the actual likelihood youll be shot.
That number could be much scarier.
Even so, gunshot victims have a surprisingly high survival rate.
This story was originally published in 2017 and updated with new information on 3/2/2020.
