The statistics are not necessarily new. Gun violence is now the leading cause of death for children and teens in America. More than half of Americans have been personally impacted by gun violence. One-fifth of Americans have been threatened with a firearm. America stands alone among developed countries in its rates of gun violence, which are on the rise.
What was new late last month was that the country’s top health official, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy, declared gun violence a “public health crisis.”
Such advisories from the surgeon general “are reserved for significant public health challenges that require the nation’s immediate awareness and action,” according to the Department of Health and Human Services. They are infrequent, but sometimes drive needed policy changes. For example, a 1964 warning is credited with helping shift perceptions about smoking and to focus attention on the dangers of tobacco, which led to federal law changes.
Murthy’s suggested solutions to reduce gun violence — safe gun storage requirements, a ban on assault weapons, universal background checks, better and more accessible mental health care — are not new. However, they have failed to gain support on a national level, despite the rising death toll from gun violence, including suicide.
Maine got a horrifying wakeup call to the realities of gun violence in October when a gunman shot and killed 18 people and injured 13 more in Lewiston. It was the worst of the more than 600 mass shootings in 2023. That traumatic event prompted soul searching and re-thinking of past stances among elected officials, including Gov. Janet Mills and U.S. Rep. Jared Golden.
Mills, who also called for consideration of gun violence as an issue of public health, introduced comprehensive legislation that included an expansion of background check requirements in the state, changes to Maine’s yellow flag law and additional funding for and expansion of mental health services. That bill became law. The governor also signed into law a new 72-hour waiting period for gun purchases. She vetoed a bump stock ban citing its imprecise language. The U.S. Supreme Court recently overturned a federal bump stock ban saying that the Trump administration overreached when it changed course in 2018 after the nation’s worst mass shooting to outlaw the devices, which essentially turn semi-automatic weapons into automatic weapons.
After the Lewiston shooting, which occurred near his home, Golden called for a federal ban on assault weapons. There has been no action in Congress on such a ban.
Murthy’s advisory and its sobering statistics should prompt action from lawmakers at the state and federal level. Maine lawmakers, for example, should revisit efforts to strengthen Maine’s yellow flag, or extreme risk protection order, law to allow family members to petition to have guns temporarily taken away from those who pose a risk to themselves or others. A stronger version of this law, often called a red flag law, may have potentially helped in the case of Robert Card II, the Lewiston shooter, who exhibited many troubling signs before his killing rampage in October. Maine’s law only allows law enforcement to begin the process of temporarily taking away someone’s guns. Lawmakers ran out of time this spring when considering a proposal to create a red flag law in Maine, which could allow family members to initiate the process.
The surgeon general’s advisory makes it abundantly clear that lawmakers cannot be diverted from the hard work needed to make America safe from gun violence, while respecting 2nd Amendment rights to gun ownership.
“People want to be able to walk through their neighborhoods and be safe,” Murthy told The Associated Press in a phone interview in late June. “America should be a place where all of us can go to school, go to work, go to the supermarket, go to our house of worship, without having to worry that that’s going to put our life at risk.”
These simple goals too often feel out of reach. The surgeon general’s advisory is a reminder that with thoughtful solutions, America can turn the tide against the deadly scourge of gun violence, even if those solutions are difficult to enact.
