Safety Record

Both tear gas and pepper sprays have exceptionally good safety records. The U.S. Army reports that CS has never been implicated in a human death despite years of use. In addition, no substantiated deaths have been reported following the use of pepper or tear gas sprays by civilians.

Information from several law enforcement agencies indicates a significant drop in injuries in police departments that use defensive chemical sprays. For example,

In a 1990-1992 study conducted by the Portland, Maine, police department, subjects in reported force incidents were injured in 69% of the situations, and officers were injured in 31%.  Since they began using pepper spray there have been 226 reported force incidents. Only 12% of the subjects and 12% of the officers were injured during these situations.

While tear gas and pepper sprays have excellent safety records, they are weapons. Proper training is strongly recommended, both to increase the effectiveness of defensive sprays when used for self-defense and to minimize the potential for injury or accident exposure.

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