“Owning a gun in America is easier than owning a dog – we can be thankful we live in the UK” – Voice of the Mirror

Joe Biden is the latest in a long line of presidents trying to legislate gun laws in a country where more young people die in shootings than in car accidents

Owning a gun is easier than owning a dog in some US states. In Texas, where 19 children and two teachers were butchered in the worst massacre since Sandy Hook, a barber needs a license to use scissors but not a gun.

A nation of 335 million owns 400 million guns, and more young people die in shootings than in car accidents.

The American gun lobby says guns don’t kill people – people kill people.

Which stubbornly misses the point that people with assault rifles can kill more people than if they only had access to a knife.

Our Geraldine McKelvie was at a gun show in Houston yesterday to show how easy it is to buy such a gun.

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Joe Biden is just the latest in a long line of presidents — barring gun-loving Donald Trump — to attempt to introduce effective gun control laws, to no avail.

The National Rifle Association and the Republican Party are in cahoots to keep it that way, despite the 45,000 Americans killed by guns each year.

Against such opposition, Congress is powerless to ban the sale of high-performance killing machines or prevent the insane from getting their hands on them.

We in this country fail to understand how deeply ingrained the right to bear arms is in the American psyche.

As each new transatlantic atrocity unfolds on our televisions, we can only be thankful that we live where we do. Where last year the police were only forced to shoot and kill two people. Unlike American cops who gunned down 1,055.

air complaint

Hospitalizations for asthma have halved during the Covid pandemic, largely because lockdowns have meant less air pollution.

This should give policymakers an indication of what is needed to combat this debilitating disease.

But in parts of the north, twice as many children will need inhalers as in the south. Experts blame bad air quality and poor housing conditions for such stark differences.

The numbers we are releasing today should be enough to make Michael Gove redouble his efforts to ensure his leveling agenda effectively tackles such inequalities.

His job now is to ensure that the zip code lottery in healthcare ends.

And ended forever.

birth not scope

When Hayley Roberts joined a slimming club, she lost five pounds and gained 9 pounds 7 ounces.

But there is an endearing explanation for this puzzling arithmetic.

Hayley was born without a uterus so she needed a surrogate to carry a baby for her.

The club’s weight loss consultant, Sophie Bennett, volunteered for the role.

And when beautiful baby Rosie arrived, they both agreed that this was some weight they never wanted to lose.