Gun Violence Spiked To 25-Year High In 1st Year Of Pandemic: CDC

ACROSS AMERICA — Gun violence spiked to a 25-year high during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, with firearms used in 79 percent of all homicides and 53 percent of all suicides in 2020, according to a report Tuesday from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The firearm homicide rate increased 35 percent from 2019 to 2020. Suicides involving guns also remained high, the CDC noted.

Firearm homicides increased in all population groups — men and women in both urban and rural areas — but of particular note was a 39 percent increase in firearm homicides among Black people, the CDC said. The increase was particularly stark among Black males ages 10-44. Gun homicide rates in that group were 21.6 higher than among white males of the same age, according to the report.

Also troubling was a 42 percent increase in firearm suicides among indigenous American Indian and Alaska Native people (42 percent). The study also noted that people who live in poverty saw increased gun violence.

Increases in both gun homicides and suicides in counties with high poverty levels were 4.5 and 1.3 times higher, respectively, than in counties with low poverty rates, according to the report.

“The tragic and historic increase in firearm homicide and the persistently high rates of firearm suicide underscore the urgent need for action to reduce firearm-related injuries and deaths,” CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said in a statement.

“By addressing factors contributing to homicide and suicide and providing support to communities, we can help stop violence now and in the future.”

The CDC said gun violence is influenced by “long-standing systemic inequities and structural racism that limit economic and education opportunities.”

The report didn’t reach a conclusion about why gun violence surged in 2020 but said that “against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, the substantial increase in the firearm homicide rate, along with notable increases in firearm suicide rates for some groups, has widened racial, ethnic, and other disparities.”

“For example, young people, males, and Black people have the highest firearm homicide rates and experienced the largest increases in 2020,” the CDC wrote in an overview of the study published on its website, noting, "The reasons for the increasing rates and widening disparities are likely complex.”

Among the factors in the surge in gun violence, the CDC said:

• Changes and disruptions to services and education.
• Mental stress.
• Social isolation.
• Economic pressures including job loss, housing instability and difficulty covering daily expenses.

Debra Houry, the director of the CDC’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, told The Hill that pandemic-related stress was likely a factor in gun violence increases.

“When you look at a lot of these communities that were already hard hit, you add stressors to them, job loss, economic uncertainty, social isolation, those can be risk factors for violence,” she said, emphasizing that gun violence is preventable.

“A lot of times people find injuries and death are inevitable,” Houry said. “You know, just kind of something that happens, and something that happens to somebody else. And it’s not, it’s preventable, and it happens to our family members or community members, those around us, and so we must act now to prevent it.”

Last month, the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions issued a report calling the surge in gun violence homicides “the largest one-year increase in modern history.”

“Nearly 5,000 more lives were lost to gun homicide in 2020 than in 2019,” Johns Hopkins researchers said in their analysis of federal gun violence data. “Gun suicides remained at historically high levels. Guns were the leading cause of death among children and teens in 2020, accounting for more deaths than COVID-19, car crashes, or cancer.”

Federal health officials are waiting to see if gun violence will surge higher in 2021. Houry told CBS News that early figures collected by the CDC, including surveillance data from emergency rooms in 10 states, shows 17,000 gun homicides and 22,000 through October 2021.

“If the observed patterns continue from November and December, then we would see that both firearm homicides and suicides will likely turn out to be higher than those in 2020,” Houry said.

Gun violence was increasing before 2020, Houry said, but “certainly the pandemic has exacerbated it.”