Does gun control reduce fatal violence? Addressing disputes on the evidence

Richard Matzopoulos, Senior Specialist at the Medical Research Council’s Burden of Disease Research Unit will present this lecture.

 Recent epidemiological evidence suggests that the enforcement of the Firearms Control Act of 2000 was largely responsible for the steady decline in fatal violence in South Africa. Various stakeholders in the firearms and security sector dispute this. 

In this presentation, Richard Matzopoulos, Senior Specialist at the Medical Research Council’s Burden of Disease Research Unit and Visiting Associate Professor at Wits in the School of Human and Community Development, examines the competing datasets, methods and interpretations of the evidence in addressing these opposing positions. His findings hold important implications for both the research on the regulation of firearms in South Africa.

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