Abortion Is Not the Leading Cause of Child Deaths in the US
The Claim
Abortions are the leading cause of child deaths in the U.S, not gun related injuries.
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Many Twitter users have circulated a claim that guns are not the leading causes of child death and that abortion is the leading cause. The claim comes following a speech by the U.S. President Joe Biden on the Uvalde mass murder shooting spree, where he said that guns are the leading cause of death for children.
Misbar’s Analysis
Misbar’s team investigated the claim and found it to be fake, studies show that the leading cause of death amongst children since 2020 was gun related injuries. Moreover, abortion is the termination of a pregnancy by removal or expulsion of an embryo or foetus and does not involve the killing of a child.
Increasing Gun Violence
A study released in the New England Journal of Medicine as of 2016, shows that the two leading causes of child deaths were firstly motor vehicle accidents (20% of deaths) and secondly gun related incidents (15.4% of deaths), as shown in the table taken from the study below.
Photo Description: Leading causes of child deaths as of 2016.
However, more recent data shows that as of 2020, gun related injury had surpassed motor vehicles deaths as shown in the graph below.
Photo Description: Graph showing death by firearm related injury surpass motor vehicle crashes.
Abortion Does Not Constitute Child Deaths
By definition, abortion is the termination of a pregnancy, either an embryo or foetus. Since no child is born, an abortion cannot constitute the killing of a child.
Joe Biden Responds to Uvalde School Shooting
Following the Uvalde school shooting which took the lives of 19 children, President Biden gave a heartfelt speech, pleading with politicians particularly Republicans to “do something,” given that Republicans oppose gun control measures. During the same speech the President said that gun violence is the leading cause of child deaths in the U.S, this statement sparked the claims. Biden called for the legal minimum age to buy a gun to be changed from 18 to 21 years.
Despite the increase in shooting sprees, a study found that almost 3% of the U.S population, or 7.5 million adults “became first-time gun owners during the pandemic between January and April 2021.” This would expose 11 million people, including 5 million children to having firearms in their households.
Since the shooting occurred, the gun safety and accessibility debate in the U.S is once again in the spotlight. This year alone, there were 231 mass shootings in the U.S, the latest of which was in Tulsa on June 1st, where a gunman shot four people in a medical centre before killing himself.
Based on the findings, Misbar’s team confirms that the claim is fake, gun related injuries are the leading cause of child deaths in the U.S.
