The preventable tragedy in Lewiston, Maine, is yet another reminder that horrific mass shootings are far too common — and a uniquely American problem. Once again, a weapon built for battle has stolen 18 people’s lives, injured 13 others, and traumatized an entire town. In mass shootings that dominate headlines, in the almost daily gun violence that haunts some of our most vulnerable communities, in the relentless toll of gun suicide, the United States suffers every day from gun violence. Other countries don’t live like this, and we don’t have to live like this either. Sensible gun laws can — and in some states do — prevent these mass shootings before they happen. But in order to get there, we cannot be led astray by scapegoating mental illness.
Scapegoating mental illness is especially ineffective in preventing mass shootings.
While the assailant in Lewiston reportedly had previous psychiatric hospitalizations, it is a mistake to simply blame the shooter’s mental illness for this attack and move on. Despite the consistent focus on mental illness as a major cause of gun violence, only about 4% of violent incidents can be attributed solely to mental illness. Irresponsibly promoting the myth that links mental illness with dangerousness perpetuates stigmas that create even more barriers to mental health care. Someone with a mental illness is far more likely to be a victim of violence than a perpetrator.
Further, scapegoating mental illness is especially ineffective at preventing mass shootings. Less than 5% of mass shooters would have met the qualifications to bar them from owning or purchasing a firearm based on severe mental illness. To the point: The U.S. is not the only country where a significant proportion of the population lives with mental illness, but we are the only country that regularly endures mass shootings — and that is due to our easy access to firearms.
Research shows there is a better way to intervene and keep firearms away from people likely to inflict tragedies like the one in Lewiston.
Instead of maintaining a potentially counterproductive focus on mental health diagnoses, we need to look at behavioral risk factors. Public health experts have known for decades that the greatest indicator of future acts of violence are past acts of violence. Couple this with factors like drug and alcohol misuse, repeated interactions with law enforcement, and other risky behaviors, and we get an understanding of indicators for potential violence that are more predictive than a diagnosis of mental illness alone. This is about looking at risk and following epidemiology, not perpetuating stigma.
Extreme risk laws are a proven and effective way to prevent gun suicides and mass shootings.
Maine has a policy in place known as a “yellow flag law,” which aims to prevent gun violence by stopping people with a history of mental illness from obtaining firearms. But because this law focuses almost exclusively on mental illness, and only allows law enforcement rather than close family or friends to make a petition, it lacks the public health perspective that is needed to make an impact. Some have said that Maine’s yellow flag law is akin to extreme risk laws. But in reality, Maine’s yellow flag law operates in direct contradiction to the purpose of extreme risk laws.
Extreme risk laws are a proven and effective way to prevent gun suicides and mass shootings. These work by empowering law enforcement, families or other professionals to ask a court to temporarily prohibit an individual’s access to firearms if that person shows they are at risk of harming themselves or others. In Connecticut, for every 10 to 20 risk warrants that were issued, at least one suicide was prevented. In the first three years of California’s extreme risk law, there were at least 58 instances of orders being used against individuals who threatened mass shootings. In at least 21 of these cases, none of the threatened attacks occurred, and none of the subjects of these risk orders were subsequently linked to homicides or suicidal acts. Importantly, these laws were intentionally built around initial recommendations by the Consortium for Risk-Based Firearm Policy to avoid a reliance on mental health diagnoses and to focus instead on behaviors that best indicate potential future violence.
Currently, only 21 states and the District of Columbia have such laws, which stop not only mass shootings but also gun suicides that account for three of five annual gun deaths in the U.S. The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, signed into law last year by President Joe Biden, will invest $750 million over five years to educate the public so that extreme risk laws can be used as effectively and efficiently as possible.
While we all want to prevent yet another mass murder like the one in Lewiston from happening again, we must not follow the red herring of mental illness but must instead follow the facts. An overwhelming majority of Americans are demanding meaningful change to prevent not just tragedies like these, but all forms of the gun violence that has defined our country. It is on each of us to ensure solutions are rooted in evidence so we can end this public health crisis and protect future generations from this horrific new normal.