Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
As Covid Soared, So Did Gun Deaths — To Near-Record Rates
Stat: Firearm Deaths And Disparities Both Grew In Pandemic’s First Year
Guns were the weapons wielded in more than three-quarters of homicides in the U.S. during the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic, jumping 35% from 2019 to 2020 and marking the highest level since 1994, a new CDC analysis says. The suicide rate involving guns was stable at just over half of suicides, but there were increases in some groups of people. The most striking disparity came among young people. Guns killed Black children and young adults from 10 to 24 years old at a rate 21 times as high as among their white peers. “We’re losing too many of our nation’s children and young people, specifically Black boys and young Black men,” Debra Houry, acting principal deputy director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said in an interview with STAT. “The difference between Blacks and whites in that age group for firearm homicide is just devastating.” (Cooney, 5/10)
NPR: U.S. Gun-Related Homicide Rate Jumped Nearly 35% In 2020
The rate at which Americans were killed in gun homicides leapt by nearly 35% in 2020 to the highest level in more than 25 years, according to new research by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Amid the pandemic and recession that followed, gun homicide rates grew most among groups that were already at higher risk, researchers found — including people in poor areas, young men, and Black people. In 2020, the firearm homicide rate was 6.1 per 100,000 Americans — up from 4.6 a year earlier. (Sullivan and Greenfieldboyce, 5/10)
Roll Call: CDC: 2020 Saw Most Firearm Deaths Since 1994
From 2019 to 2020, the firearm homicide rate for Black people between the ages of 10 and 24 was more than 21 times higher than for white people in the same age group. The overall firearm suicide rate remained relatively unchanged from 2019 to 2020 at 8.1 per 100,000 people, but there were increases among some groups of people, including American Indian/Alaska Native males. In total, there were 24,000 firearm suicide deaths in 2020. (Hellmann, 5/10)
The New York Times: Gun Deaths Surged During The Pandemic’s First Year, The C.D.C. Reports
“This is a historic increase, with the rate having reached the highest level in over 25 years,” Dr. Debra E. Houry, acting principal deputy director of the C.D.C. and the director of the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, said at a news briefing. More than 45,000 Americans died in gun-related incidents as the pandemic spread in the United States, the highest number on record, federal data show. The gun homicide rate was the highest reported since 1994. (Rabin and Arango, 5/10)
Also —
CIDRAP: More Racial Minority Deaths From Violence, Overdose Amid COVID-19
American Indian/Alaska Native and Black Americans died of murder, suicide, vehicle crashes, and drug overdoses at higher rates than their White and Asian/Pacific Islander peers amid the twin threats of the opioid epidemic and the COVID-19 pandemic, finds a US modeling study published yesterday in JAMA Internal Medicine. (Van Beusekom, 5/10)
