Will Obama’s order lead to surge in gun research?

These file photos shows one of Charles A. McCoy Jr.'s guns included in evidence during his 2005 murder trial in Columbus, Ohio, left, and a side crash test on a 2008 PT Cruiser by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. (AP Photo/Tim Revell, Insurance Institute for Highway Safety)

MILWAUKEE (AP) — Nearly as many Americans die from guns as from car crashes each year. We know plenty about the second problem and far less about the first. A scarcity of research on how to prevent gun violence has left policymakers shooting in the dark as they craft gun control measures without much evidence of what works.

That could change with President Barack Obama’s order Wednesday to ease research restrictions pushed through long ago by the gun lobby. The White House declared that a 1996 law banning use of money to “advocate or promote gun control” should not keep the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other federal agencies from doing any work on the topic.