Firearms were the leading cause of death for children and adolescents in the US in 2020

New research has revealed that guns became the leading cause of death for children and teens in the US in 2020, surpassing car accidents.

A study by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) showed that, throughout that year, more than 4,300 youth died from firearm-related injuries.

Look: The controversial case of Melissa Lucio, the Latina sentenced to death in Texas for the death of her 2-year-old daughter

While suicides contributed to the number of victims, the majority of firearm deaths are related to homicides, the data showed.

It is estimated that at least 390 million weapons are in the hands of civilians in the US.

Youth at risk

According to the research, which was recently published in the New England Journal of Medicinethe increase in the number of deaths of minors and young people between 1 and 19 years of age in the US influenced the total increase of 33% that was reported in the number of national homicides.

Homicides, the study noted, disproportionately affect young people in that country.

GETTY IMAGES

During the same period, the US firearm suicide rate increased by 1.1%.

The overall rate of deaths for any reason (suicide, homicide, unintentional, and undetermined) increased 29.5% among children and adolescents, more than double the rate for the general population.

“We continue to fail to protect our young people from a preventable cause of death,” said a letter published in the magazine on Wednesday.

The rate of gun-related deaths per 100,000 population increased among men and women and among ethnic demographics between 2019 and 2020, reporting the largest increase among black Americans.

weapons on the rise

GETTY IMAGES

In recent years, gun-related deaths had ranked second only to car accidents as the leading cause of death among young people in the US.

However, deaths from traffic accidents have decreased over time: in 2020, the number of people under the age of 19 who lost their lives in this way in the US was 3,900.

Incidents of drug overdoses and intoxications increased by 83.6% between 2019 and 2020, and are now the third leading cause of death in that age group.

A study published in early April found that 954 young people died from overdoses in 2020, compared to 492 in 2019.

Gun violence in the US has increased since the covid-19 pandemic began in early 2020.

“The reasons for the increase are unclear,” the researchers’ letter says.

“It cannot be assumed that firearm-related mortality will later return to pre-pandemic levels.”

Another study, published in Annals of Internal Medicine in February, it found that 7.5 million adults in the US, just under 3% of the population, bought their first gun between January and April 2021, during the pandemic.

With this, at least 11 million people were exposed to domestic firearms, 5 million of them children.

Source: Elcomercio