Quoted:


This ^^^ is the most dangerous concept in that article IMO, and this assertion cannot be allowed to stand.

I am a 20+ year public health professional and have, for half or more of my tenure, worked almost exclusively in the field of Injury and Violence Prevention (a legitimate and widely recognized field of public health).  I am, as you would imagine, an exception in this field as it (PH in general and IVP in particular) tends to draw disproportionately more liberal professionals into these careers.  The vast majority of what we study and try to prevent in IVP is based on science and consistent with actual statistics, focusing the lion's share of our efforts to prevent the most common and preventable types of injuries (vehicular crashes, unsafe infant sleep environments, drownings, fire and smoke injuries, etc.).

But evidence and stats go out the window when it comes to "gun violence" because... well, because GUNS!  Yuck!!!  Icky!!!!

Because of the predominant political bent of folks who fund IVP programs, set policy and priorities, etc., there is a very noticeable disconnect between the way firearm injury and death are handled as compared to all other types of injury and injury-related death.  Data and narratives are presented in manners that skew the perception of the issue, in a very clear effort to make the public believe that the issue is greater than it actually is.  It isn't that firearm injury/death is not a valid PH/IVP topic... it's that it is actually somewhere between getting struck by lightning and drowning in a bucket in terms of both prevalence and ease of prevention, while it is presented to the public as if it is more common than vehicular crash injury/death and just as preventable (or more so).

I have been in regional and national meetings of PH/IVP professionals where we were being told that we SHOULD do this and we MUST do that regarding guns and, when I (or others, I am in a small minority but I am not completely alone) have had the opportunity to ask "Where is the evidence to support this course of action?" you could hear a pin drop.  The broad assumptions and misrepresentation of data WRT guns that take place with general blessings from all involved would never be tolerated within any other sub-field or issue of IVP, and they all know it.

Sorry for the but this is very personal to me because I have witnessed it time and again in my field.  It is a very obvious and generally accepted double standard in a field otherwise held to rigorous standards of evidence-based practice.