WHENEVER there are mass killings in the U.S., a resurrection of the gun control debate occurs. Mass killings, where high-powered guns are the weapons of choice, have for some time now become a prominent part of the culture of violence in the U.S. Then a few weeks after the mass killings, the debate dissipates into the humdrum of daily life, until another mass killing reappears.

Recently, on Linkedin, I posted this question on ‘Global Public Health’: ‘Is gun crime a public health issue?’ At this time, there are 42 comments on this question. I will selectively present some people’s observations, and then conclude on today’s Perspectives.
Environmental health specialist Janel Waterhouse dismissed the views by some people that Americans are paranoid about their safety, hence their need to own guns. She contended that the idea of American gun ownership started with militias (private armies) which played a huge role in winning the revolution by defeating the British. The American Constitution, arising out of this victory, sought to protect this right to bear arms through the militia. The thinking then was if a government becomes evil, then the militia can act to remove that evil.
But over the years, the National Rifle Association (NRA) championed individual gun ownership over a militia-type of gun ownership, and so the notion of a militia receded into the background. The NRA insisted on absolute gun rights as protected by the Constitution. Gun ownership comprises two categories-hunting/recreational and criminal. Waterhouse felt that the political line on gun ownership currently is to ensure that criminals have less access to high-powered guns.
Gun ownership is a huge part of American culture, Waterhouse added. She claimed that the argument that if no one owns a gun, then there is no need to defend oneself does not stand up to rigorous testing, because of the constitutional right to bear arms in the U.S. With this right, the NRA argues that gun ownership prevents crimes, which is a fallacy, according to Waterhouse. She noted that the issue is the battle for gun control for public protection versus the constitutional right to own a gun.
Then there was Carol Chenco of La Trobe University who recommended that the right to bear arms should be reinterpreted because what the term ‘arms’ meant at the time of the American Revolution might be quite different from what it means today. Gordon Macpherson of UNICEF asserted that Europeans spurn Americans for their lack of knowledge and blind authority to the gun law and the U.S. Constitution.
A police officer David Jones posted the view that gun violence is not a gun problem; the violence has more to do with it being a people problem; and he said that even if there were no guns on this planet, Cain would still be able to kill Abel without using a gun.
Jones further brought posters’ attention to a study of multiple-victim public shootings in the U.S. between 1977 and 1995 by William Landes of the University of Chicago and John Lott of Yale University; they examined several proposals then which are now being reviewed as a response to the recent Newtown, Connecticut massacre-waiting periods and background checks for gun ownership; limited magazine capacity;the  death penalty and severe penalties for gun crimes; they found that not one of these policy measures reduced multiple-victim shootings.
Nurse Consultant Mariëlle Beringen drawing on Schoolwerth et al. (2006) noted that anything (in this case we are referring to a gun problem) is a public health issue when the disease impacts many people; when the problem does not impact everyone in the same way; when preventive measures can reduce the problem; and when evidence shows that adequate preventive measures are not used.
The U.S. gun crime problem is a public health issue. The Gun law and the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution endorsing the right to bear arms limit the scope of public health practitioners to address the gun issue. In order for public health to positively impact gun violence, the question of repealing the Second Amendment is at stake. Then there is the argument that the gun problem is not an issue; what is at issue is people. And so in this respect, in relation to the recent U.S. gun violence, is gun the issue or is it the family as a social system? Is the family as a social system functional or dysfunctional?