As we noted in last month’s Bulletin, a new Control Arms campaign report, The impact of guns on women’s lives, looks at the impact on women of guns in the home; in communities; and during and after conflict. This month we have produced a fact sheet which summarises the report’s key findings on armed violence against women in the home. The printed report is available from IANSA in English, Spanish and French.

Intimate partner homicide is a major problem

• In France, the Ministry of Health reported that on average six women a month die at the hands of their current or former partners (2001 report).
• In South Africa, the Medical Research Council calculates that on average a woman is killed by a current or former partner every six hours.
• In El Salvador between September 2000 and December 2001, 134 women were murdered; an estimated 98% were killed by their husbands or partners.

Guns make violence against women worse

• When guns are used in intimate partner violence, death is twelve times more likely to be the outcome than when they are not used.

A gun in the home makes women less safe

• A study of 25 countries found that where guns are more available, more women are killed.
• Several factors affect a woman’s chances of being killed by her husband or boyfriend, but access to a gun increases the risk five-fold.
• Having a gun in the home increases the overall risk of someone in the household being murdered by 41%; but for women in particular the risk nearly triples (an increase of 272%).
• In South Africa (11 guns per 100 people) and France (30 guns per 100 people), one in three women killed by their husbands is shot; in the USA (96 guns per 100 people) this rises to two in three.

Gun law reform saves lives

• Between 1995, when Canada tightened its gun laws, and 2003, the overall gun murder rate dropped by 15%, while the gun murder rate for women dropped by 40%.
• Five years after the gun laws in Australia were overhauled in 1996, the gun murder rate for women had dropped by half.

Keep guns out of the hands of abusers.

• US research shows that prior domestic violence in the household makes a woman far more likely to be a victim of family homicide
• In South Africa, a gun licence will be refused to anyone with a record of violence, including violence against women.
• In Canada, the applicant’s current or former spouse or partner must be informed before a gun licence will be granted or renewed. They are usually asked to provide the (anonymous) reference required.
• In Australia, there is a 28-day waiting period to buy a gun – a ‘cooling off’ period.

Disarm abusers

• In South Africa police have the power to remove guns from legal owners if there is a complaint of violence.
• Disarming abusers requires a tough gun registration system; otherwise the police do not know how many guns are owned by an abuser.

Store guns safely

• Some countries, including Belarus, Japan and the UK, require guns to be stored securely, unloaded and with the ammunition stored separately.
• Women’s groups have proposed a ban on keeping a gun in the home; guns should be kept at the local gun club or police station instead.