(ANSA) - WASHINGTON, DECEMBER 15 - Americans have bought about 150 million handguns in the last ten years, from the massacre at Sandy Hook elementary school.
This was revealed by research by Harvard and Northeastern University reported by the American media according to which the main reason for buying a weapon was, paradoxically, the increase in mass massacres.
Furthermore, in a country where the main cause of death is suicide by firearm, such a widespread diffusion of handguns and rifles will lead to an increase in deaths.
People who choose to own guns in the United States are still a minority of the population, about one-third of Americans, while less than half report living in a home with a gun.
But the total number has nevertheless increased: according to the survey, it has gone from 55 million in 2015 to 75 million today.
The number of Americans choosing to carry guns in public has also grown with 16 million people saying they do it at least once a month and 6 million saying they do it daily.
A figure that is double compared to 2015. As for the reasons, according to the latest surveys, the percentage of those who have decided to buy a weapon for "self-defense" and to "protect themselves from crime and violence" is increasing.
However,
according to a Gallup research, the perception that Americans have of these phenomena often does not correspond to reality: in the last thirty years, for example, a large majority of the US population has stated that they believe that crime had increased compared to the previous year, when in fact it had decreased.
(HANDLE).