Mass shootings in Colorado Springs, Chesapeake and Charlottesville get headlines but everyday gun violence, suicides, accidents, need more. Gun safety is key.
When mass shootings erupt in devastating clusters, transforming grocery stores and nightclubs, schools and workplaces into instantaneous war zones, we are reminded yet again, painfully, that no other wealthy nation tolerates a metastasizing public health crisis the way we do. Colorado Springs, Chesapeake, Va., Charlottesville — the list of gun-afflicted cities grows longer almost every week.
We tend to ignore the more mundane, more common form of the crisis: gun-related deaths and injuries that occur one at a time, day after day, in Houston and Harris County and across the nation. As Chronicle staff writer Anna Bauman reported in a recent investigative article, 53 children and teenagers have died from gunshot wounds in Harris County this year, according to data from the Institute of Forensic Sciences. The death toll so far — 41 homicides, 11 suicides and one accident among children under 18 — makes 2022 the deadliest in at least five years.
Source: Editorial: It’s time to get MADD about everyday gun violence