Make America Great Again Ship Switzerland
There's a reason they don't telephone call information technology Factbook. The latest example of a misleading factoid gone viral casts restrictive gun policy as a backfiring failure, with two countries every bit case studies.
On ane side of the post is Honduras, with a population of 8.2 million people and a government that "bans citizens from owning guns." Honduras has "the highest homicide rate in the entire world," the post claims.
On the other side is similarly populated Switzerland, which "requires citizens to own guns" and has the "lowest homicide charge per unit in the entire earth."
A reader wanted to know if the post's counterintuitive message is right.
The source of the claim was not immediately clear, though we institute some examples of websites and figures repeating the bulletin.
Hither's why it'south flawed.
Population
Nosotros'll pause on the numbers and start with an overriding effect with the post's premise. It holds up population as the sole constant that justifies comparison these countries' gun policy and violence.
Even though Honduras and Switzerland are No. 94 and No. 96 in the CIA's list of countries by population, this metric lonely is not enough reason to compare the effect of unlike gun control laws in either state.
There'due south really no point in comparison the challenges of Honduras, a lower middle-income state in Primal America beleaguered past corruption and violence from the drug trade and gangs, to Switzerland, an flush land nestled in western Europe.
"Of grade, what yous want to do is compare countries where everything else is the aforementioned, except for guns and gun laws, to run across if guns and gun laws have any effect," said David Hemenway, director of the Harvard Injury Control Research Eye at the Harvard School of Public Health. "Switzerland and Honduras are not even shut to being the aforementioned in many aspects of their society that will influence the levels of violence and homicide."
The mail ignores a litany of cultural, political and socioeconomic factors that play into gun violence, or a lack thereof. The gross domestic product per capita, to name one, is $two,435 in Honduras and $84,733 in Switzerland, according to the Earth Bank.
"The determinants of homicide rates are multiple and not very well understood, and guns laws may indeed be ane amongst many, many determinants," said Christopher Mikton, World Health System technical officer for violence prevention. "Simply to bespeak them out equally the sole crusade is wrong."
But even if y'all cull to ignore the macrofactors, the post messes up the particulars, also.
Rates
Honduras indisputably has the highest homicide rate in the globe, with estimates ranging from a charge per unit of 90.iv intentional homicides per 100,000 people in 2012, co-ordinate to the Un, to 103.ix per 100,000 population, according to the Globe Health Organisation. This was significantly college than the rates of neighboring El salvador (41.two), which has reduced its homicide rate following a truce amid gangs, the United nations said in its 2013 Global Report on Homicide.
The vast majority, more than 80 percent, of those homicides are linked to a firearm. Lethal shootings well-nigh ofttimes occur in urban centers and areas along the Atlantic declension and edge regions, which suggests the violence is linked to drug trafficking patterns and gangs, according to a report on Honduras by the Pocket-sized Artillery Survey, a Swiss-based enquiry project.
Switzerland's homicide rate is among the everyman in the world, but the meme goes too far in proverb it'southward the very lowest. Past the United nations and WHO measures, the near recent Swiss intentional homicide rate is 0.6 deaths per population.
Several countries — including Japan and Singapore, which have very strict gun laws, besides as Iceland and Luxembourg — posted lower rates than Switzerland in either one or both of the United nations and WHO information sets.
Laws
The post is wrong most the gun laws in each state.
Honduras doesn't "ban" citizens from owning guns.
The Small Arms Survey says the most pop gun in Honduras is the 9mm handgun, "which can be legally purchased and endemic" — undermining the meme'due south claim that Hondurans are banned from owning guns. Considering this weapon is banned in nearby United mexican states, the UN has said the divergence in laws fosters the exchange of illegal weapons betwixt the countries.
An analysis of gun laws in six Latin American countries by Insight Crime, a foundation that studies crime and policy in Cardinal America, characterizes Honduras' regulations as "light" compared to the "restrictive" laws of Brazil and United mexican states and "moderate" laws of Venezuela and Republic of chile. Uruguay also has "light" gun control laws but an incredibly smaller homicide rate than Honduras of about 5.9 percent per 100,000 people. (Information technology also has less organized crime.)
The disparity in homicide rates and gun control laws showed "gun legislation, on its own, ways piddling in terms of gun violence," the Insight Offense analysis institute.
The gun civilization in Switzerland is altogether different. The country boasts the third-highest firearm ownership per capita rate, trailing the top-ranked United States and Yemen. Honduras is No. 88.
A 2012 Time story most Switzerland'due south gun culture notes how citizens hold their right to own guns as a patriotic duty, and Swiss children frequently join sharpshooting groups to hone their skills.
But, once more, Switzerland does not require "citizens to own guns."
The government issues a gun to men for their mandatory military service, but the gun is taken home under "carefully controlled atmospheric condition without ammunition," said Mikton, the WHO officer who is also Swiss.
"As presently as they have finished their military service — typically around 30 years of age — they have to return the gun," he said.
Swiss gun laws are more than strict than the post implies, though less tough than some other European Spousal relationship countries. Swiss law requires mandatory background checks on noncombatant handgun purchases and licenses for the concealed carry of weapons, and it bans automatic weapons.
Our ruling
The viral postal service aims to jolt readers with a counterintuitive implication: Gun laws can lead to mortiferous unintended consequences.
Only the post is flawed on many levels. The comparing based on similar population size lonely is shallow, and non-scientific. Moreover, Switzerland does not accept the world'due south lowest homicide level, and the post is flatly wrong almost the laws in each country.
This claim rates Pants on Burn down!
Source: https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2015/sep/30/viral-image/viral-flawed-post-compares-honduras-switzerland-gu/
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