The New England Journal of Medicine Stumps for Gun Control post-Heller
The New England Journal of Medicine
It is well documented in the medical literature that regulation of guns benefits the public health. For example, a careful study4 demonstrated that the 1976 restrictive handgun law in the District of Columbia, which was the focus of the Heller case, resulted in an immediate decline of approximately 25% in homicides and suicides by firearms, but there was no such decline in adjacent areas that did not have restrictive laws.
Wait a minute! Guns are available in the neighboring states and they don't have the same crime rates that DC has! More gun doesn't mean more crime! The truth is that DC has a cultural violence problem that has been displaced by gentrification, much like Chicago's "gun-problem".
They are right about this:
With the Supreme Court's decision and the expectation of a substantial reduction in gun regulation, we are poised to witness another epidemiologic study of the effect of regulation on gun violence. With this experiment, which may play out in many American cities, we will know in the coming years whether the overturned laws reduced death and injury from handguns.
Since the cultural problems seem to be getting better, mortgage-crisis to boot, I doubt that we'll see "blood in the streets" like DC through the mid-1990's.
Posted 04:12AM Jul 10, 2008 by MCSA
