As Anxieties Rise, Californians Buy Hundreds of Thousands More Guns
Handgun sales in California have risen to unprecedented levels during the COVID-19 pandemic, and experts say first-time buyers are driving the trend.
Dr. Garen Wintemute, director of the UC Davis Violence Prevention Program, is among the experts concerned about the connection between gun sales and a rise in domestic violence incidents as families have been forced to shelter together amid pandemic-related quarantines and shutdowns.
“If a firearm is involved, risk that intimate partner violence will have a fatal outcome goes up by a factor of five,” Wintemute said.
Learn more about the Center for Violence Prevention Research