The Virginia Department of Health (VDH) tracks all types of firearm-related deaths. These include suicides, homicides, unintentional deaths, those related to legal intervention or war, or deaths with undetermined intent. The data can be used by community groups, healthcare providers, law enforcement, and others working to prevent firearm-related deaths. Data on this dashboard are from death certificates of Virginia residents only, including those who died out of state.
Firearm–related death data by age group, race/ethnicity, sex, health district, and intent of injury are available for download.
This dashboard is updated annually by December for the previous calendar year.
The Firearm-Related Deaths among Virginians dashboard was revised on February 10, 2025. There are no changes to firearm death counts. Small changes to death rates per 100,000 population occurred. Small differences in rates may be seen in data accessed before February 10, 2025.
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Download firearm deaths data or read more information about the data.
About the Data
The VDH Office of Vital Records tracks causes of death among Virginia residents using death certificates. Codes on the death certificate indicate underlying and contributing causes of death.
Case Definition: Deaths are classified as firearm-related using the definition from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention State Injury Indicators Report.
Intent: Firearm-related deaths include all intent types: suicide, homicide, unintentional, legal intervention or war, and undetermined.
Measures: Death counts and rates per 100,000 population. Rates per 100,000 population for firearm-related deaths use single-race population estimates produced by the U.S. Census Bureau and obtained from CDC WONDER. Rates published on this dashboard before December 2024 used bridged-race population estimates produced by the National Center for Health Statistics. This data source was discontinued. All rates per 100,000 population on the dashboard were recalculated using the single-race population estimates. Small differences in rates may be seen in data accessed before December 2024.
Geography: Data are of Virginia residents only, whether or not they died in Virginia. Health district is based on the residence of the patient at the time of death, not where the death occurred.
Other: Death certificate data are the data source used by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to report on firearm-related deaths for states, jurisdictions, and the United States. For this reason, use death certificate data when comparing firearm-related deaths across jurisdictions. Firearm-related death counts on this dashboard may differ from reported counts from the VDH Office of the Chief Medical Examiner (OCME). This dashboard reports deaths of Virginia residents only and based on the decedent's residence at time of death, whereas OCME reports on firearm-related deaths that occurred in Virginia.