Can a pregnant woman shoot a 22 rifle

[halfmileharry]

Get the baby a gun for it's birthday present.
I'm not a gun salesman so YMMV.

 

[GIJEW]

What I know is that a pregnant woman 7 or 8 months along attended a pistol match just to watch. She said the baby jumped every time a gun was fired. I took that to mean the baby could hear the gunshots

What is the harm in waiting until after delivery?

Exactly. If you do a cost:benefit analysis, what's the rush? A lot of teaching and practice can be done dry-fire prior to delivery. FWIW the MD told my wife to wait because of sound and lead.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

Humans are resilient. YMMV. Way too much nannyism going on in todays world. IMHO.

Not particularly resilient to lead poisoning, especially as youths. Lead exposure for pregnant women increases the risk of fetus death and a host of developmental issues. While I'm all for HTFU and deal with it, I generally give a fetus a pass.

https://www.cdc.gov/nceh/lead/tips/pregnant.htm

 

[glock212327]

Just make sure to bring a extra set of glasses and ear protection to put on her stomach. All kidding aside my wife had two kids and both times I would not let her shoot lead issues. In my opinion I would not want to take a chance but that's me. Now we all shoot as a family.

 

[gmcttr]

First off, I fully agree with the 'better off safe than sorry, why not wait' line of thought and the risk posed by lead poisoning, however, I don't agree with some of "Xaviers" information.

Xavier Thoughts: Shooting and Pregnancy
Shotgunworld.com ? Shooting While Pregnant NOISE

"foam plugs offer attenuation of 12 to 20 dB and are considered to be the least effective hearing protection. Common sense tells a person that noise travels more quickly and has greater effect in a fluid, such as is present in the womb"

The package of the foam plugs I use claims 32 dB sound reduction and more importantly, my experience finds properly placed foam plugs reduce the noise level far better than high quality muffs.

...Yes, noise transfers through liquid faster than air, but it does not cross the liquid/air boundary particularly well. Ever put your hands over your ears to protect them from sound? Ever go underwater and try to listen to someone talking from outside the water?

Agreed. As a kid, I spent many summer days at the lake and there is no doubt that yelling adults, passing boats, fireworks, etc. were much​ quieter with your head underwater compared to above water.

 

[dugsagun]

They make 22lr rounds that are quieter than regular supersonic loads. The subsonic ones, and those that are powered only by the priming compound. Those should be about as quiet as someone's mom yelling at their kids to go to bed at 10pm on a school night.

 

[Thor]

Not particularly resilient to lead poisoning, especially as youths. Lead exposure for pregnant women increases the risk of fetus death and a host of developmental issues. While I'm all for HTFU and deal with it, I generally give a fetus a pass.

https://www.cdc.gov/nceh/lead/tips/pregnant.htm

Shoot at an outdoor range? People used to eat off lead plates yet here we are.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

Shoot at an outdoor range? People used to eat off lead plates yet here we are.

Doctors used to bleed people for bad humors as well. It doesn't mean it was a good idea or that it didn't have ill effects.

 

[Sniper 79]

I didn't risk it with my wife. Once she was fertilized the shooting stopped. Noise and lead is not ok with me. She hasn't been to the range since. Someone has to stay with the kids now. My trips went from four times a week to four times a year if I am lucky.

Funny how things change in life.

 

[SpartanHD]

I didn't risk it with my wife. Once she was fertilized the shooting stopped. Noise and lead is not ok with me. She hasn't been to the range since. Someone has to stay with the kids now. My trips went from four times a week to four times a year if I am lucky.

Funny how things change in life.

They get older eventually. Hobbies kinda go on hold when kids are little.

 

[M67]

1) Silencers FTW

2) If you're that concerned, load the mags and the rifle for her to minimize "exposure" or have her shoot a bolt action instead of a semi auto and still load the magazine for her. With the air quality in the city, possible old arsenic treated wood, preservatives in food, it amazes me the freak out factor of shooting once while pregnant. I'd be more concerned about the noise and that's where a can comes into play. Humans have been reproducing for what? 100,000 years in less than ideal conditions and environments and we're been decently okay. You're going shooting, not dropping acid or shooting heroin. Personal beliefs though

 

[maxmayhem]

just have her shoot a baby desert eagle. It's designed for babies.

 

[alabasterjar]

This is my wife shooting .223 about a month before our oldest was born....


Wouldn't have considered this at an indoor range, but outside, no problem. Ymmv.

 

[Mgderf]

I won't cast judgement, but will offer one fact.
The local indoor range forbids pregnant women from even entering the range.
They are welcome in the shop, not the firing area is off limits, regardless of the length of their pregnancy.

I'm sure it's probably more of a litigious matter, but ultimately you have to make your own choice.
There are no laws against it that I know of.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

1) Silencers FTW

2) If you're that concerned, load the mags and the rifle for her to minimize "exposure" or have her shoot a bolt action instead of a semi auto and still load the magazine for her. With the air quality in the city, possible old arsenic treated wood, preservatives in food, it amazes me the freak out factor of shooting once while pregnant. I'd be more concerned about the noise and that's where a can comes into play. Humans have been reproducing for what? 100,000 years in less than ideal conditions and environments and we're been decently okay. You're going shooting, not dropping acid or shooting heroin. Personal beliefs though

Taking reasonable precautions =/= freakout. The missing info in your "we're doing decently ok" is the extreme reduction in infant and mother death rates due to trying to make conditions and environments as ideal as possible.

CDC: [FONT=&quot]At the beginning of the 20th century, for every 1000 live births, six to nine women in the United States died of pregnancy-related complications, and approximately 100 infants died before age 1 year (1,2). From 1915 through 1997, the infant mortality rate declined greater than 90% to 7.2 per 1000 live births, and from 1900 through 1997, the maternal mortality rate declined almost 99% to less than 0.1 reported death per 1000 live births (7.7 deaths per 100,000 live births in 1997) (3) ([/FONT]Figure 1[FONT=&quot] and [/FONT]Figure 2[FONT=&quot]). Environmental interventions, improvements in nutrition, advances in clinical medicine, improvements in access to health care, improvements in surveillance and monitoring of disease, increases in education levels, and improvements in standards of living contributed to this remarkable decline ...[/FONT]