[Federal Register: November 16, 2006 (Volume 71, Number 221)]
[Notices]
[Page 66785-66786]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr16no06-80]
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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
[30 Day-07-0607]
Agency Forms Undergoing Paperwork Reduction Act Review
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) publishes a
list of information collection requests under review by the Office of
Management and Budget (OMB) in compliance with the Paperwork Reduction
Act (44 U.S.C. Chapter 35). To request a copy of these requests, call
the CDC Reports Clearance Officer at (404) 639-5960 or send an e-mail
to omb@cdc.gov. Send written comments to CDC Desk Officer, Office of
Management and Budget, Washington, DC or by fax to (202) 395-6974.
Written comments should be received within 30 days of this notice.
Proposed Project
The National Violent Death Reporting System--extension--National
Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC), Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention (CDC).
Background and Brief Description
Violence is an important public health problem. In the United
States, homicide and suicide are the second and third leading causes of
death, respectively, in the 1-34 year old age group. Unfortunately,
public health agencies do not know much more about the problem than the
numbers and the sex, race, and age of the victims, all information
obtainable from the standard death certificate. Death certificates,
however, carry no information about key facts necessary for prevention
such as the relationship of the victim and suspect and the
circumstances of the deaths, thereby making it impossible to discern
anything but the gross contours of the problem. Furthermore, death
certificates are typically available 20 months after the completion of
a single calendar year. Official publications of national violent death
rates, e.g. those in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, rarely use
data that is less than two years old. Public health interventions aimed
at a moving target last seen two years ago may well miss the mark.
Local and Federal criminal justice agencies such as the Federal
Bureau of Investigation (FBI) provide slightly more information about
homicides, but they do not routinely collect standardized data about
suicides, which are in fact much more common than homicides. The FBI's
Supplemental Homicide Report system (SHRs) does collect basic
information about the victim-suspect relationship and circumstances,
like death certificates, it does not link violent deaths that are part
of one incident such as homicide-suicides. It also is a voluntary
system in which some 10-20 percent of police departments nationwide do
not participate. The FBI's National Incident Based Reporting System
(NIBRS) addresses some of these deficiencies, but it covers less of the
country than SHRs, still includes only homicides, and collects only
police information. Also, the Bureau of Justice Statistics Reports do
not use data that is less than two years old.
CDC therefore proposes to continue a state-based surveillance
system for violent deaths that will provide more detailed and timely
information. It taps into the case records held by medical examiners/
coroners, police, and crime labs. Data is collected centrally by each
State in the system, stripped of identifiers, and then sent to the CDC.
Information is collected from these records about the characteristics
of the victims and suspects, the circumstances of the deaths, and the
weapons involved. States use standardized data elements and software
designed by CDC. Ultimately, this information will guide states in
designing programs that reduce multiple forms of violence.
Neither victim families nor suspects are contacted to collect this
information. It all comes from existing records and is collected by
state health department staff or their subcontractors. Health
departments incur an average of 2.0 hours per death in identifying the
deaths from death certificates, contacting the police and medical
examiners to get copies of or to view the relevant records, abstracting
all the records, various data processing tasks, various administrative
tasks, data utilization, training, communications, etc.
Violent deaths include all homicides, suicides, legal
interventions, deaths from undetermined causes, and unintentional
firearm deaths. There are 50,000 such deaths annually among U.S.
residents, so the average state will experience approximately 1,000
such deaths each year.
There are no costs to the respondents other than their time. The
total estimated annualized burden hours are 55,000.
Estimated Annualized Burden Hours
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Number of Average burden/
Respondents Task name Number of responses/ response (in
respondents respondent hours)
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State Health Departments.............. Case Abstraction........ 20 1,000 2
[[Page 66786]]
Record Retrieval........ 20 1,000 0.5
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Dated: November 9, 2006.
Joan F. Karr,
Acting Reports Clearance Officer, Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention.
[FR Doc. E6-19374 Filed 11-15-06; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4163-18-P