plymouth shooting - are guns a rising problem in the uk?

[cheeseandpickle12]

this shooting has really made me anxious. i have bad postpartum anxiety and after seeing that he killed a toddler on a walk with her dad i asked my partner not to take our baby for a walk tonight as i just feel so scared by it as if it’s going to start happening everywhere :(

are guns a rising thing in the uk? i don’t understand how he got a licence. i didn’t even think that was an option here.

Gun crime is really, really rare in UK

Licensing is clearly fallible, as we saw this week, but it was tightened up enormously after the Dunblane shootings in 1996. There are hardly any mass shootings - the most recent one before thus was in 2010.

Yes, there are individual criminal shootings, but at a far lower rate than in places where firearms laws are less strict.

Unless you live in an area with significant levels of gang activity, you are really unlikely to be caught up in any firearms incident.

I can sympathise with your sense of shock though, especially as you are anxious already - take a couple of cocooning days to regain some equilibrium.