Inflated Claim About Guns and Self-Defense Returns to CDC Website

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Inflated Claim About Guns and Self-Defense Returns to CDC Website

cross-posted from: https://piefed.world/c/politics/p/1355007/inflated-claim-about-guns-and-self-defense-returns-to-cdc-website

https://www.thetrace.org/2026/08/defensive-gun-use-statistics-cdc/Open link View original on piefed.world

Comments3

3 replies

ryper

lemmy.ca

Why is the Center for Disease Control even posting about guns and self-defence?

thatsnothowyoudoit reply

lemmy.ca

Probably because they used to be part of education machine for how dangerous guns were - and that, by far, firearm fatalities from suicide account for over half (58% in 2023) of gun deaths.

Source: https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2025/new-report-highlights-us-2023-gun-deaths-suicide-by-firearm-at-record-levels-for-third-straight-year

But now, with an administration that politicizes everything - and ignores any evidence of facts that dispute their goals - they’re turning the tables.

Note: am not American and also own several firearms. Was surprised when taking our country’s requisite firearms safety course that the overwhelming focus was on self harm and reduction of those risks. (And since we’re here - it’s shocking how many gun owners immediately assume I’m far right leaning just because I’m next to them at the range with a firearm in my hands; no friend healthcare IS WAY more important than this tool.)

SupraMario

lemmy.world

Bryant told The Trace that the CDC’s decision to restore the numbers was a “shame.” He dismissed the figures as “nothing more than gross estimates based on limited surveys.” Hughes, meanwhile, called the agency’s move “disappointing but unsurprising,” adding, “It is the politically motivated laundering of disinformation that has become a hallmark of the Trump administration’s approach to all scientific inquiry, and gun violence is no exception.”

Funny coming from the guy who runs the GVA which includes school gun violence that isn't researched at all. Yet reported as fact. So much so that even NPR reported on how badly the GVA did.

https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/08/27/640323347/the-school-shootings-that-werent