Automobiles are responsible for more deaths each year than guns. If the goal is to preserve human life, then we might start by reducing the number of cars and licensed drivers. At the same time, the majority of gun deaths (over 60%) are attributed to suicide. To reduce these deaths, we should look at the question of why people would want to kill themselves. Perpetrators of violent crimes are likely to use other weapons to harm people. If they're willing to kill or rob in the first place, they are also likely willing to use an illegal weapon to do it.
An increasingly centralized government is restrained by and afraid of individuals who protect their personal sovereignty by owning a fire arm. This is precisely what the authors of the U.S. Constitution intended. I say this as someone who does not own a gun, nor ever intends to own one. Asking people to turn in or destroy the fire arms they already have is unconstitutional, impractical and pointless. I don't see how in the world that would happen regardless of the public's or media's sentiment, which incidentally are irrelevant.