Steve Forbes, chairman and editor-in-chief of Forbes Media, on Tuesday called for increased focus on schizophrenia in the gun debate.
MSNBC host Chris Jansing asked Forbes whether the Newtown massacre had led him to reconsider his views on gun limits.
“Well, in terms of the assault ban, we tried that for 10 years, and all the research shows that it had absolutely really no effect at all,” Forbes said. “What I think the emphasis should be, instead of new gun laws — yes, you can tighten up in terms of background checks and the like, there’s real work that has to be done there — but the real focus has to be on schizophrenia. I mean, the idea that we have people who are seriously mentally ill wandering our streets, we would not do that with people with Alzheimer’s. But a lot of these mass murders are done by people who are severely sick. They should be treated instead of wandering around on the streets. And I think research there would go a long ways in dealing with these mass murders. And that’s where the focus should be.”
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