Here in the United States, anti-gunners routinely use suicides by firearm in their numbers for “gun deaths” as a way to push for more gun control. Never anyone mind that unless someone is a convicted felon or adjudicated as “mentally defective,” they can still buy a firearm despite any gun control law you care to put on the books. No, none of that matters to them.

In their mind, the only potential solution to suicides by firearm is more gun control.

However, even in (at least)parts of Canada, most firearm-related fatalities are suicides.

Over a 15 year period, more than two-thirds of all gun-related deaths in Ontario were suicides that impacted mostly older men living in rural areas, according to a new study published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal on Monday.

Doctors from the Unity Health Toronto network of hospitals examined health administrative data held at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences on firearm-related deaths and injuries in Ontario from 2002 to 2016.

They found that 67.6 per cent of deaths linked to guns in the province — a total of 1,842 — during that period were suicides, and mostly impacted older men living in rural areas.

The researchers also discovered that the majority of gun-related injuries in Ontario are due to self-harm, making up 68 per cent of those injuries and again impacting mostly men over 45, living in rural communities.

Huh. Sounds about like our numbers, doesn’t it?

Meanwhile, Canada has all kinds of gun laws. For example, you’re required to have a license to buy any kind of a firearm. Getting one of those requires one to undergo a training course prior to obtaining said license. Honestly, it’s worse than buying a gun in Illinois or California.

And yet, two-thirds of all people killed with a firearm in Ontario are killed in suicides.

For the record, Ontario has a population of about 14.5 million. I mention that to put the total number of suicides in a little perspective. That’s less than twice the population of New York City.

Anyway, despite the myriad of gun laws on the books in Canada, these people still took their own life. It seems the Canadian healthcare system managed to fail them as well. So much for that idea, eh universal healthcare advocates?

This shouldn’t be particularly surprising, though. Suicide, despite what many anti-gunners claim, isn’t something you can pass a law and eliminate. Hell, on the world state, the United States is ranked 27th in suicide rate while literally every nation higher up the chart. In fact, it’s less than half of that of Lithuania and Russia, which are numbers one and two respectively.

Yet both nations have more restrictive gun laws than the United States, though Lithuania’s aren’t particularly awful as European nations go.

If gun laws had an appreciable impact on suicide, countries like 14th ranked Japan would have non-existent suicide rates. Yet, they do.

That’s because suicide is a mental health issue, not a gun issue. This focus some anti-gunners have with suicide only goes so far as gun control, which mean’s it’s nothing more than a cynical attempt at a power grab.

Then again, what else is new?