Gun Injuries to Children Have Soared. So Have Their Impacts

Firearms have accounted for the deaths of more American children than any other cause since 2020. The true damage guns inflict on children is larger still, as demonstrated by a new study showing that emergency-room visits for children injured by firearms nearly doubled during the pandemic. In a survey of nine U.S. hospitals, a team led by Dr. Jennifer Hoffmann, a pediatric emergency medicine physician at Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, found that pediatric emergency room visits due to gun shots increased from 694 in the years before the pandemic to 1,210 during the pandemic, a 74% increase, according to data from 2017 through 2022. During that time, the death rate among gun victims age 18 and under nearly doubled as well, from 3.1% to 6.1% of all children injured by firearms. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] That increase was apparent to physicians who worked in emergency rooms throughout the pandemic, Hoffmann says. But for the first time in decades, she and other researchers were able to secure federal funding to study what they were seeing, thanks to a longtime freeze on grants supporting research on gun violence that was only lifted in 2020. Hoffmann’s study is one of two published yesterday (Nov. 6) that help reveal the full extent of the problems gun violence poses to American kids, their families, and the health care economy. More From TIME [video id=WGEnrjwq autostart="viewable"] An increase in child firearm injuries ear...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized healthscienceclimate Source Type: news