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Social Justice BriefCONTRIBUTORS:Jeremy Arp Executive Director, NASW Arizona

Rebecca Gonzales Director of Government Relations, NASW California

Marc Herstand Executive Director, NASW Wisconsin

Mel WilsonManager, NASW Department of Social Justice and Human Rights

Gun Violence in the American Culture

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The dramatic explosiveness of mass murders—especially those linked with terrorism—hascaptured most of our attention over the years,but as gun violence prevention advocates we should focus on the pervasiveness anddemographic complexity of gun violence. This violence—in its many forms—affectsevery segment of the United States regardless of age, ethnicity, race, or otherdemographic categories.

The purpose of this brief is to look at gunviolence from a public health context. Wealso intend to examine the problem from asocial work perspective by analyzing it froma social determinant of health viewpointrelated to gun violence’s psychosocialimpacts on various sub-populations.

Background The debate over curtailing gun violence isvery much tied to the national debate overgun violence prevention. Early on, the disputewas framed as what some assume to be aSecond Amendment right to bear arms (many

other Americans disagree with the prevailinginterpretation of the Second Amendment)versus the need for regulation of gun ownership.In an effort to avoid the trap of being accusedof advocating for gun control, anti–gunviolence activists have been fairly successfulin reframing the discussion as a gun rightsversus sensible gun policies debate.

The national movement to curb gun violencefrom a perspective of public health was animportant departure from the gun controlposition. As the head of the American PublicHealth Association (APHA) stated, “We’re notdebating the constitutionality of firearms—thatexists. Firearms exist and people get hurt anddie from firearms. There are ways for us in anonpolitical manner to make people saferwith their firearms in a society” (para. 3).

The APHA statement is another example of astrategic step to get around being allegedly infavor of trying to take guns away fromAmericans. Instead, making public health thecentral focus helps to shape a sensible gun

Gun Violence in the American CultureAmerica has been devastated by gun violence for decades in both urban and

rural communities. Recently a significant number of Americans have become

concerned about the pervasiveness and almost normalization of gun violence.

We can point to three examples of gun violence that have been the impetus for a

movement to bring about reforms in gun ownership: the shooting of James Brady

during the assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan in 1981, the shooting of

Congresswoman Gabby Giffords in 2011, and the more general increase of

highly publicized gun-related mass killings between 2006 and 2017.

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laws debate as a concern for preventinggun-related deaths and injuries. Couching thedebate in a public health frame also facilitatesand justifies the call for a public–privatecollaboration to apply public health principlesto responding to the gun violence crisis.

There are ample data to justify declaring gunviolence a public health crisis. For example,the combined number of Americans eitherkilled or injured each year by guns is 114,914(33,880 killed and 81,114 injured). Bycomparison, during 2013, over 33,000people died from auto accidents. Similarly, a 2009 study indicated that there were41,000 deaths each year among adults from secondary cigarette smoke.

Overview of Gun Violence Statisticsin the United StatesAccording to a study by the Brady Campaignto Prevent Gun Violence, » Every day, 309 people are shot in murders,assaults, suicides and suicide attempts,unintentional shootings, and policeinterventions.» Of those, 93 people die from their injuries. » This adds up to 33,880 cases of death and81,114 cases of injury per year.

Public Health & Public Health Social Work Public health is the science of protecting and improving the health of families andcommunities through promotion of healthylifestyles, research for disease and injuryprevention and detection, and control ofinfectious diseases. Overall, public health isconcerned with protecting the health of apopulation, whether it’s a local neighborhood,an entire country, or a region of the world.

Public health social work is a contemporary,integrated, trans-disciplinary approach topreventing, addressing, and solving socialhealth problems. Over 100 years old, itdraws on both social work and public healththeories, frameworks, research, and practice.Public health social work is about prevention;uses multiple methods, including research,policy, advocacy, clinical, and macroapproaches; works across population levels,from individuals to groups, communities, andwhole populations; is strengths-based; andemphasizes resilience and positive factors topromote health and reduce risk.

Population Health & SocialDeterminants of Health The problem of gun violence should be seen from a population or subpopulationepidemiology point of view. The following isa demographic review of the frequency ofgun violence:

Urban Gun Violence It should not be surprising that there aregeographical determinants for exposure tocertain types of gun violence. Certainly, gunviolence in major urban areas, often associatedwith youth gangs, must be discussed. It is wellknown that gun violence among young blackmen in major U.S. cities is unacceptably high.As a result, young black men are nearly sixtimes more likely to die from homicide thanyoung white men; 82 percent of homicides of young black men were the result of gunviolence. Among the nonblack population,most gun deaths are ruled accidental or theresult of suicide, with only 34 percent of gundeaths determined to be murder.

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Other related statistics on this issue:» Firearm homicide is the leading cause ofdeath for African Americans between theages of one and 44;» African Americans make up nearly 13percent of the U.S. population, but in 2009 suffered almost 24 percent of allfirearm deaths—and over 54 percent of all firearm homicides. » In all, African Americans have the highestrate of gun deaths per 100,000 people ascompared to other races/ethnicities. In thepublic health context, being young, black,and living in a low-income urban area is asocial determinant of health because of therelatively high risk of being injured or slainby a firearm.

It should be added that homicides are also aleading cause of death for Hispanic men. Infact, gun violence among young men of colorfar outpaces that of young white men. The datashow that among 10- to 24-year-olds, homicideis the leading cause of death for AfricanAmericans; the second leading cause of deathfor Hispanics; and the third leading cause ofdeath for Native American and Alaska Natives.

Gang Violence The existence of youth gangs and gunviolence associated with gangs should not be overlooked. In reviewing the Office of

Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Preventionreports, gangs, gang membership, andgang-related homicides all increased between2007 and 2012. During that same time,there was a significant decline in gangactivity in smaller cities. These data suggestthat there was an increase in the concentrationof gang activity in larger metropolitan areas.

Further exacerbating gun violence within thestreet gang culture is the illicit drug trade, inparticular the opioid crisis. For example, inNew Orleans, there were 252 shootingincidents through June of 2017. Thisrepresented a large increase from theprevious year. Although there may be otherexplanations for the increase, New Orleanspolice believe that it is directly related to anincrease in gang violence due to attempts tocontrol the opioid street trade.

Gun-Related Suicides Suicide represents the largest percentage ofgun deaths on an annual basis. Every yearapproximately 22,000 people kill themselveswith guns. In addition, suicide is the secondmost common cause of death for Americansbetween the ages of 15 and 34, according tothe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention(CDC). Across all ages, it is the 10th mostcommon cause of death and caused 1.6percent of all deaths in 2012.

In looking at all gun deaths in America; aclear and distinct racial pattern emerges. Ithas been found that most whites who die fromgunshots do so by committing suicide, whereasa similar proportion of blacks killed by a gundie because of a homicide. There is a similargeographic split for gun-related suicidescompared with gun-related homicides. Moregun homicides happen in ethnically diverse

G A N G M A G N I T U D E I N D I C A T O R S

Indicator 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Gangs 27,300 27,900 28,100 29,400 29,900 30,700

Gang members 788,000 774,000 731,000 756,000 782,500 850,000

Gang-related 1,975 1,659 2,083 2,020 1,824 2,363homicides

Source: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention

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urban areas, whereas most suicides occur inthe rural areas that are predominantly white.Such data are very important from a publichealth standpoint. They speak directly tosocial determinants of health in patterns ofgun-related deaths and injuries.

Suicides Risks of Older White MalesLooking at suicide from a population viewpoint,it is evident that age, gender and race arekey variables that need to be considered. In general, suicide is more prevalent amongwhites than other ethnic or racial groups inthe United States. In particular, middle-agedand older white men.

In 2015, the highest suicide rate (19.6) wasamong adults between 45 and 64 years ofage. The second highest rate (19.4) occurredin those 85 years or older. Younger groupshave had consistently lower suicide rates thanmiddle-aged and older adults. In 2015,adolescents and young adults aged 15 to 24had a suicide rate of 12.5. Taking into accountthat gun suicides are more common thangun-related homicides-accounting for 64percent of all gun deaths in 2012.

Effective prevention of gun-related mortality andmorbidity is to gain a deeper understandingof cultural factors that contribute to high risk.In the case of the rising suicide rates for olderwhite men, there appears to be an intersectionbetween reasons for suicide with olderAmericans per se, and factors that are uniqueto older white men. Though there is no definitiveand conclusive research on causation, there arelife-events that are linked to clinical depressionand, in turn, suicide risk among the elderly:» The recent death of a spouse, familymember or friend» The fear of a serious chronic illness» Social isolation and feelings of loneliness» Major life changes, particularly retirement

Culture-based risk factors that appear to bespecific to older white men-especiallyassociated with higher rates of deaths withinthis sub-population include:» Men of all races and ethnicities are morelikely to die by suicide than women.» Although women attempt suicide at agreater rate than men, the mortality rate ofsuicide is significantly higher among whitemen than women.» The age adjusted suicide rate in white menwas almost four times as high as that ofwhite women.

White men are more likely to use highly lethalmethods such as guns and hanging. Womenare more likely to attempt suicide by methodsthat can be reversed, such as drug overdosesand poisoning.

Clearly, there is a need for more researchand demographic analysis- which control forage, gender, race and cultural variations- onchanges in the prevalence of gun-relatedsuicide attempts and deaths.

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Mass MurdersThe technical definition of mass murder is four or more murders that happen during oneincident with no periods of reflection or“cooling off” by the assailant(s) between themurders. Often, a mass murder occurs at onesingle location. Although a mass murder canbe a dramatically tragic event—as when 49people were killed in the Pulse nightclub inOrlando, Florida—a shooting of multiplepeople often garners limited, if any, headlinesin the media. High-profile shootings such asthe June 14, 2017, shooting of a congressmanand four others at a baseball practice by alone gunman understandably get nationalheadlines and news coverage. However,there is certain irony to the fact that on thesame day, a gunman in San Francisco shotand killed three people before committingsuicide. Only several weeks prior to that masskilling, a Mississippi shooter killed six people.There was very limited press coverage of theSan Francisco and Mississippi shootingsbeyond the initial reports. The point is thatexcept for the highly dramatic mass murders,the deaths and injuries from workplace anddomestic violence mass shootings havebecome mundane and far too ordinary.

However, statistically, mass shootings are arelatively small part of the 30,000 or morepeople who are killed by guns annually.People killed in mass shootings make up lessthan half of 1 percent of the people shot todeath in the United States.

Children’s Exposure to Gun-RelatedDeaths and Injuries » According to the scientific literature,American children face substantial risks ofexposure to firearm injury and death. In

2014, 4,300 young people between theages of 10 and 24 were victims ofhomicide—an average of 12 each day;2,647 died from their injuries.» Firearms kill almost 1,300 Americanchildren—under 18 years of age—eachyear, and boys and black children are mostoften the victims, a U.S. study finds.» Of the gun-related deaths of children undereighteen, 50 percent were homicides, 38percent were suicides, and 6 percent werefatalities from accidental gun injuries.» Each year, guns seriously wounded about5,800 additional youngsters under 18.» An emergency department visit for nonfatalassault injury places a youth at 40 percenthigher risk for subsequent firearm injury.» Among children, the majority (89 percent)of unintentional shooting deaths occur inthe home. Most of these deaths occur whenchildren are playing with a loaded gun intheir parent’s absence.» In states with increased gun availability,death rates from gunshots for children werehigher than in states with less availability.

Research also suggests that children are morelikely to die or suffer injuries from accidentalgun shots. We have already established thatblack Americans are significantly more likelythan white Americans to be gun homicidevictims. However, it is also true that blackAmericans are only about half as likely astheir white counterparts to have a firearm intheir home (41 percent versus 19 percent)—and Hispanics are less likely than AfricanAmericans to be gun homicide victims andhalf as likely as whites to have a gun at home(20 percent). The inference from these data isthat there are population based disparitiesabout the type of gun violence risk to which

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American children are exposed. For example,white children have a higher risk to be avictim of an accidental shooting, blackchildren have a higher risk of being a victimof homicide.

Early Childhood TraumaChildren are particularly vulnerable when itcomes to gun violence both as direct victimsand as being traumatized by the exposure tothe deaths of family members, friends, andneighbors. For example, there have beenmany studies about early childhood trauma inyoung children from neighborhoods in majorU.S. cities with a persistently high rate of gunviolence. Social workers have responded tothe interrelatedness of gun violence and earlychildhood trauma. During a recent conferenceon the public health aspects of gun violenceat the University of Southern CaliforniaSuzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work,a panelist stated that “the brains of youngkids do not develop the way they werebiologically destined to if they live inneighborhoods pervaded with trauma,especially gun violence and similar activities.We have tens of thousands of kids in thiscommunity who are never going to grow upto fulfill who they’re meant to be. You [socialworkers] have a central role in changing that.The cause of combating gun violence is notjust for a lawyer or a lawmaker or aprosecutor—it’s for you” (para. 13).

The city of Chicago is fairly or unfairly oftenused as the nation’s paradigm for inner cityviolence. A recent article on the impact ofpersistent exposure to gun violence made thepoint that the destruction caused by gunviolence in Chicago’s most vulnerable andpoorest neighborhoods is almost secondary

to the trauma of seeing repeated acts ofviolence and experiencing the deaths ofloved ones, and can be compared to being in a war zone. These experiences result inincreased incidence of posttraumatic stressdisorder and early childhood trauma.

According to a 2012 report, traumaexperienced early in life significantly increasesrisks for and severity of posttraumatic mentalhealth disorders. As is well known, suchtrauma could compromise children’s long-termpsycho-emotional development, which couldresult in problems in adulthood, includinganxiety disorders and drug abuse. The reportreinforces the conclusion that children seeingurban gun violence on a regular basis candevelop symptoms similar to those of combatveterans. Worse still is that many low-incomecommunities of color often lack access tomental health care resources.

Victims of Domestic ViolenceThere are compelling data that domesticpartner violence, especially against women,is a population-specific problem. As is truewith all the sub-populations that have highrisks for exposure to gun violence, domesticpartner shootings are preventable. The dataon domestic violence in the United Statesindicate that » more than half of the women killed withguns are murdered by their partners. » every month, 50 women are shot and killedby a current or former boyfriend or spouse.» 57 percent of mass shootings involved apartner or other close family member whowas killed.

Based on a 2016 Associated Press analysisof national and state law enforcement data,

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an average of at least 760 Americans areshot to death by current or former partnersannually, and some believe that these numbersare possibly higher. Approximately 75 percentof the victims in domestic violence shootingsare the current wives or girlfriends of the menwho attacked them.

That victims of gun violence stemming fromdomestic partner abuse are predominantlywomen is significant to the discussion ofpopulation-based public strategies as well asshaping current gun ownership laws at thefederal and state level.

Mental Health as a Factor in Gun Violence The link between mental illness and gunviolence has been debated for many years. Forexample, the 1968 Gun Control Act barredanyone who had a history of being committed toa psychiatric hospital or had been adjudicatedas being a “mental defective” from purchasingfirearms. In 1993, the Brady Handgun ViolencePrevention Act reinforced that prohibition. Ithas only become more strictly enforced in theintervening years, with the passing of theNational Instant Criminal Background CheckImprovement Act in 2008, as well as bystatewide initiatives. According to the GallopPoll, many people believe that mass shootingsare caused by a failure of the mental health caresystem as opposed to the easy access to guns.In the same poll, 80 percent of the respondentsindicated their belief that mental illness—to adegree—is the root cause of such incidents.

The best estimates are that people with seriousmental illness are three times more likely thanthose who are not mentally ill to commit violentacts again themselves or others. However, onlyabout 2.9 percent of all people with serious

mental illness commit violence. And of thatgroup, gun violence plays a limited role.Perhaps 4 percent of all firearm homicides,according to research as recent as last year,can be linked to serious mental illness.There is a valid resistance to using one’shistory of mental illness to restrict access topurchasing guns. As an alternative, somemental health advocacy organizations haverecommended the use of behavior criteriabased on more defined indicators ofpotentially dangerous behavior, such as asubstance abuse disorder or a history of childabuse or domestic violence. A drawback torelying on the behavior criteria is thatclinicians’ abilities vary in accuratelyidentifying which behaviors predict violence.

Easy Access to Guns There are 300 million guns in the UnitedStates, roughly twice as many per capita asthere were in 1968. Most advocates for theend to gun violence would agree that onepreventive measure would be to reduceaccess to firearms, especially high-poweredand high-capacity assault rifles. It has alsobeen suggested that a key factor in reducinggang-related gun violence is curtailing accessto hand guns. Therefore, there is strongadvocacy for strengthening policies andenforcement to greatly reduce trafficking ofillegal guns. By law, felons and juvenilescannot purchase guns. Consequently, thereare thriving gun trafficking markets in mostmajor U.S. cities. Five out of every six firearmsused in crime were illegally obtained.However, almost all guns used in crimes wereoriginally purchased legally on the gunmarket. This means that licensed firearmsdealers are directly or indirectly involved indiverting guns into the illegal gun markets.

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The illegal gun market consists of both guntrafficking rings that acquire guns as legitimatepurchases or by gun thefts, and individuals whopurchase guns for convicted felons or youths.This includes the purchases of high-poweredand high-capacity assault weapons as well ascheap hand guns. The result is that there is analmost unfettered availability of guns toyouths and convicted felons in large cities.

Gun Policies, Laws, and LegislationNASW and other public health advocateshave assertively taken the position that theissue of gun violence is distinct and separatefrom the right to own firearms. The imperative,as with all past and current national life-threatening health crises, is to mobilizestakeholders to prevent and greatly reducegun-related deaths and injuries. For that reason,we support sensible gun laws and policiesthat are aimed at keeping weapons out of thewrong hands, sensible regulations limitingaccess to high-powered assault firearms andhigh-capacity magazines, and promoting gunsafety that includes penalties for negligentexposure of children to loaded firearms.

Prohibitions on Conducting Research onGun Violence Rep. Jay Dickey (R-AR) led a 1996 enactmentof an amendment that had long-term impacts ongun violence research. The Dickey Amendmentassured the prohibition of public funding of gunviolence research and human embryo researchby the CDC and the National Institutes ofHealth (NIH). The amendment does allow theCDC to maintain surveillance data on guninjuries and deaths, but it has not been ableto fund studies aimed at reducing harm fromguns since 2001.

The implications of restrictions on gun violenceresearch are far-reaching. Communities andsub-populations at risk of gun violence facedifferent issues depending on their racial,cultural, socioeconomic, and geographicaldemographics. To plan and implement gunviolence prevention models, it is critical thatempirical research is conducted to help identifypopulation-specific risk factors, the community’sperception of its risk for gun violence, andanalysis of prevalence of gun violence withina sub-population in comparison with that ofthe general population.

Existing Legislation Federal law covers many requirements forfederally licensed firearms dealers:» Performing background checks onprospective firearm purchasers » Maintaining records of all gun sales » Making those records available to lawenforcement for inspection » Reporting certain multiple sales» Reporting the theft or loss of a firearm fromthe licensee’s inventory.

However, the federal background check lawdoes not apply to unlicensed sellers. This leavesa gaping loophole in federal oversight ofuniversal background checks. The Gun ControlAct of 1968 stated that persons “engaged inthe business” of dealing in firearms had to belicensed. Because the term “engaged in thebusiness” was ambiguous, the 1986 FirearmsOwners’ Protection Act sought to clarify it.However, in so doing the act excluded anindividual who “make[s] occasional sales,exchanges, or purchases of firearms for theenhancement of a personal collection or for ahobby, or who sells all or part of his personalcollection of firearms” (p. 2). This exclusion

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allowed people to sell guns at gun shows oreven out of the back of their cars withouthaving to complete a background check.

It should be noted that 18 states and the Districtof Columbia have extended the backgroundcheck requirement beyond federal law to someprivate sales. Eight states and the District ofColumbia require universal background checksat the point of sale for all transfers of allclasses of firearms, including purchases fromunlicensed sellers. Two other states have thesame law, but sales are limited to handguns.Four states require anyone who buys a firearm,including when bought from an unlicensedseller, to obtain a background check.

Policies to Reduce Gun ViolenceIn a broader sense, gun violence preventionfalls under the spectrum of overall violence inthe United States. Therefore, a consensuspublic health goal for reducing violence isboth necessary and essential. The caveat isthat we must recognize that a “one size fitsall” prevention model does not exist. Manyvariables must be considered when fashioningviolence prevention programs. For instance, weknow that the factors that cause gun violenceare demographically and geographicallydiverse. Therefore, the content and messagingin gun violence prevention programs must betailored to diverse sub-populations. Along thoselines, there are national violence preventionguidelines that are applicable to our discussionon public health–based gun violence preventionstrategies and mobilization. The following is asynopsis of Public Health Goals for ViolenceReduction that emerged out of a symposiumheaded by the National Center for Domesticand Sexual Violence.

The first step in preventing and reducing gunviolence is to come to a national consensusthat this is indeed a public health emergency.Therefore, the guidelines suggest that (a)there must be visible, high-level leadershipthat prioritizes the need for gun violenceprevention; (b) it is important to prioritize abalanced (considering all demographicvariables) approach to primary prevention ofgun violence; (c) there should be a focus onany perceived or actual disparities and therole of social determinants that increase therisk for gun violence in a given community,including racism and poverty; and (d) tomobilize support by reframing the issue of gunviolence as a national-level problem thatinvolves all segments of society, and not simplya problem for an isolated American group.

Interdisciplinary and Public–PrivateCollaborations The importance of participating in acollaborative mobilization of federal and stategovernment; interdisciplinary stakeholders frommedical, behavioral health, and social servicesleadership; and affected communities cannot beoverstated. Organized collaboration to addressa national emergency has proven to beeffective in the past, and will likely be effectiveon the issue of preventing gun violence.

In planning for prevention of gun violence,public health adherents have to recognize theinfluence of social determinants of health ongun violence. These influences—such ascultural differences related to gun ownership,racism and poverty, and mental health—areconcerns that disproportionately affectsub-populations. If these determinants are notrecognized and addressed, they canundermine prevention strategies. There is a

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disproportionately large impact of gunviolence on emotionally vulnerable anddistraught individuals, young people, lowincome populations, and people of color.Understanding how the social determinantswithin these vulnerable communities affect riskfor gun violence and how they influence,where, and why gun violence occurs isessential for public health professionals toimplement effective prevention strategies.

Conclusion & RecommendationsThe social work profession has a long historyof working with medical professionals onresponding to national public health crises.Social workers have played a prominent rolein prevention and early intervention duringthe HIV/AIDS epidemic, and—more recently—joined other stakeholders in responding to theopioid crisis. In addition, our professionrecognizes the public health model of socialdeterminants of health to understand andmanage public health problems that havemulticultural, socioeconomic, and geographicalvariations. Therefore, it should not be surprisingthat social workers are at the forefront inresponding to the national gun violence crisis.

With that in mind, NASW agrees with anti–gunviolence advocates that a collaborative effortis necessary to develop sensible gun violenceprevention laws, regulations, and polices.NASW embraces the followingrecommendations that we feel can lead tosignificant reductions in deaths and injuriesfrom guns:» Use of population-based social determinantsof health models to develop preventionmessages according risks influenced bycultural, geographical, and psychosocialvariation in exposure to gun violence.

» The universal application of waiting periodsbetween the purchase of a firearm, andactually taking possession of that weapon.Waiting periods allow sufficient time toperform a background check and create acooling-off period to prevent impulsive actsof violence—especially in domestic violencesituations and when people contemplatesuicide. Waiting periods are imposed bystate legislation—currently, there is nofederal waiting period. We believe thatneeds to change. » Lethal Violence Protection laws—which somestates have passed—designed to providefamilies avenues to protect themselves; theirloved ones; and, in some cases, thecommunity from gun violence. These lawsare driven by demonstration of imminentpersonal injury to self or others. For example,if a court imposes a one-year order, theindividual could have gun rights restoredwhenever the crisis or threat to self or othershas passed. Research suggests that as manyas 100 suicides may have been preventedby Lethal Violence Protection laws designedto prevent children from accessing guns. » Child Access Prevention (CAP) laws.Studies have shown that states with CAPlaws have a lower rate of unintentionaldeath than states without such laws.» Federal and local governments andcommunity stakeholders in large metropolitanareas should collaborate to address thecauses of gang-related violence. » Reviewing criteria for determining risks ordanger posed to self and others due toserious mental illness.» Developing and expanding trauma-informedclinical best practices for diagnosing andtreating early childhood trauma fromexposure to gun violence. This includes

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developing trauma-informed schools, inwhich administrators are prepared torecognize and respond to students affectedby traumatic stress.» Extending gun purchase and possessionprohibitions to people known to be at a highrisk of committing firearms-related or violentcrimes, such as violent misdemeanants,alcohol abusers, and juvenile offenderswho committed serious crimes.» Banning assault weapons and high-capacityammunition magazines.» Establishing a universal system of backgroundchecks for anyone buying a firearm orammunition.» Regulating guns and gun safety devices as consumer products by requiring theinclusion of product safety features, such as loading indicators and magazinedisconnect mechanisms, and testing theseproducts for safety prior to sale.» Encouraging the development of newtechnologies that will increase gun safety,such as personalized guns.» Removing all gag rules that apply to clinicalencounters, because patients and providersmust be free to discuss any issue, includinggun safety.» Building an evidence-based approach togun violence prevention, includingrestoration of funding and training forepidemiological research in the area ofcauses and effects of gun violence, mostlythrough the NIH and the CDC. » Requiring law enforcement oversight of gundealerships and ammunition sellers, whoshould be held accountable for negligencein the marketing or sale of these products.

Gun Violence Prevention Resources American Public Health Associationhttps://apha.org

Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violencewww.bradycampaign.org

Doctors for America www.drsforamerica.org

Gun Violence Achieveswww.gunviolencearchive.org

Law Center to Prevent Gun Violencehttp://smartgunlaws.org/category/gun-studies-statistics/gun-violence-statistics

Public Health Social Workhttp://publichealthsocialwork.org

National Coalition Against Domestic Violence www.ncadv.org

NASW ResourcesNASW » SocialWorkers.org

NASW Foundation » NASWFoundation.org

NASW Press » NASWPress.org

NASW Assurance Services, Inc. » NASWAssurance.org

NASW Center for Workforce Studies » Workforce.SocialWorkers.org

Help Starts Here » HelpStartsHere.org

Social Work Reinvestment Initiative » SocialWorkReinvestment.org

Social Work Policy Institute » SocialWorkPolicy.org

Social Work Portal » SocialWorkers.org/swportal

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