It is a belief that helped drive a historic rise in U.S. firearms sales and first-time gun owners during the COVID-19 pandemic: Having a handgun at home for personal protection will make you safer.
Groundbreaking new research conducted over a 12-year period in California shows that the opposite is true.
Between October 2004 and the end of 2016, adults in the state who didn't own a gun but took up residence with someone who did were much more likely to die a violent death than people in households without a handgun, researchers from Stanford University found.
