Fifty-three people were reportedly killed by mass shootings in America in August while 40,000 were killed by obesity during that same month.

The UK Sun reported the mass shooting deaths vs. obesity deaths, showing the media is fixated on gun violence reporting although other causes are death are exponentially higher.

They quote HBO’s Bill Maher saying, “In August, 53 Americans died from mass shootings. Terrible, right? Do you know how many died from obesity? Forty-thousand.”

Yet the Democrats want to ban commonly owned semiautomatic rifles with Robert “Beto” O’Rourke, in particular, saying, “Hell yes, we’re going to take your AR-15.”

The claim of 53 deaths from mass shootings appears to come from a New York Times story based on Shooting Tracker information. The number appears to be highly inflated as numerous Shooting Tracker mass shootings involve one death. Yet the figure is insightful in that even if reported at the inflated level, it is completely eclipsed by deaths due to obesity.

Moreover, numerous other causes of death outnumber those from mass shootings, even when shooting death figures are reported higher than they actually are.

For example, Forbes reports there were nearly 5,000 motorcycle deaths in America in 2017. If we divide 5,000 by 12, for the 12 months of the year, we see roughly 416 deaths by motorcycle each month, versus the report of 53 deaths via mass shootings in August 2019.

The National Safety Council reports that 5,051 people died from choking in 2015. Which means eight times as many people died from choking, on average, each month–420 people–than did from mass shootings in August 2019.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports approximately 3,536 drowning deaths in the U.S. annually, which works out to about 294 a month.

FEMA reported 3,645 deaths by fire in 2017, which is roughly 304 deaths by fire a month on average. Monthly levels of death by drowning and death by fire are much higher than the report of 53 deaths in a month from mass shootings.

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.