Americans are seeking solutions to our nation’s epidemic of gun violence in the wake of the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, that killed 19 students and 2 teachers — the second deadliest school shooting in U.S. history. It came on the heels of a racist massacre at a supermarket in Buffalo that killed 10 people and preceded a Memorial Day weekend that saw at least 12 mass shootings that left 8 people dead and 55 injured.
This week, the slaughter continued, with yet another deadly mass shooting at a medical building in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
About 40,000 Americans die every year from gun violence. A majority of these deaths are suicides, and more than a third are homicides, with veterans and Black men particularly at risk. Guns are now the leading cause of death for U.S. children and teens.
Gun violence is a public health epidemic, but addressing this problem is made all the more difficult because we know so little about it. America spends more money studying peptic ulcers than it does studying gun violence
Gun policy in America has been intentionally understudied for the past two decades, and we lack access to data that would allow us to address the epidemic with policies based on a shared set of facts.
In a new video, Arnold Ventures explains the current landscape of gun violence in the U.S. and the three things we can do right now to save lives while preserving Second Amendment rights: adequately fund gun violence research; follow the evidence we do have about how to reduce gun deaths; and support new approaches to reducing gun violence.
Bottom line: We need to stop just talking about gun violence. We cannot wait for the perfect political conditions. It’s time to invest in saving lives.
