[AlexandrB]

Making guns harder to access probably reduces suicide rates as well because there are few faster, easier methods of suicide than a gun[1]. I think it's valid to lump gun suicides with other gun violence for this reason.

> The consensus among public health experts is that there is strong evidence that reducing firearm suicides in contexts where more-lethal means of attempting suicide are unavailable will result in reductions in the total suicide rate (see, for example, Office of the Surgeon General and National Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention, 2012; World Health Organization, 2014; for review, see Azrael and Miller, 2016).

[1] https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/suicide.ht...

[JamesBarney]

There's actually better evidence gun control will reduce suicides than homicides.

[refurb]

Yet the US suicide rate is lower than other developed countries that have no guns.

[cinntaile]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide...

Not really.

[refurb]

South Korea isn’t a developed nation?

[TheCoelacanth]

One developed country with few guns having a higher rate but dozens with few guns having a lower rate is not a very strong argument in favor of your point.

[refurb]

Yes it does.

It shows there is zero correlation.

[jaredklewis]

Only in a simple world where any given phenomenon can only have a single cause.

For example, imagine we find that higher speed limits increase the rate of automobile accidents in a given area. That finding doesn't preclude that poorly maintained roads might also increase the rate of accidents. So just the existence of an area with a high level of car accidents and very low speed limits doesn't necessarily mean that there is no correlation or causal link between speed limits and automobile accidents. It may just mean that the area suffers greatly from other causes (like poorly maintained roads).

Similarly, I think it is fairly intuitive to assume that there are probably a host of causal factors in suicide rates. For sure, means isn't the only factor but it is an important one.

There's been research into means reduction, and it does seem to have an effect on reducing suicide. The hypothesis is fairly intuitive: many suicides are a response to a crisis, and a human in crisis-mode is not always a great problem solver; lack of an obvious means sometimes gives people some extra time to reconsider.

You can read a high level summary of some of the research here: https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/means-matter/means-matter/risk/

[mikewhy]

Is this data like way off or something? https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/suicide-deaths-firearms

[lern_too_spel]

Yes. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/suicide-deaths-firearms is the correct data. The US is worse than most other developed countries, but not that much worse.

[mikewhy]

Did you mean to repost the same link I did?

[lern_too_spel]

I did not. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/suicide-death-rates is the corrected link. My HN reader did not update the location bar after clicking to the correct page.