Could raising the purchase age for firearms from 18 to 21 reduce active shooting violence at K-12 schools? Probably. Here is a quick explanation of why I believe this change in our gun laws could save students' lives. 🧵 1/
Earlier this year, led by @PaulReeping, my colleagues @sonalirajan, Ali Rowhani-Rahbar, @JustinHeinzePhD, @AprilZeoli, @monikagoyal123, @UmMarcz, @EpiProfCharlie and I published a study on patterns in school shootings over a 20-year period from 1999-2018. 2/
As part of this study involving @ColumbiaMSPH, @CUEpidemiology, @TeachersCollege, @umichsph, @uwsph, @msu_scj, and @ChildrensNatl, I assembled a dataset of all active shooter events at K-12 schools in the U.S., documenting 49 such incidents. tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.108… 3/
While the article might be behind a paywall, the active shootings dataset is not. It should be available here: tandfonline.com/doi/suppl/10.1… 4/
The data show that, while the 18-20 age demographic accounts for only 4% of the U.S. population, 18-20-year-olds perpetrated 20% of active shootings at K-12 schools. In others words, as a demographic, this group is over-represented. 5/
Arguably more disturbing, the avg. death toll for 18-20-year-old active shooters at K-12 schools is over 5 times higher than the avg. death toll associated with younger shooters and nearly 4 times higher than the avg. death toll per incident associated with older shooters. 6/
While 49 cases might not be considered to be a lot of cases, these patterns do still demonstrate that age could be an important factor in terms of the lethality of active shootings at K-12 schools in the U.S. 7/
According to @SecretService, most K-12 school active shooters either legally buy their weapons or take them from family. This suggests that aged-based purchase laws, coupled with safe-storage laws, could keep guns out of the hands of potential school shooters and save lives. 8/8
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
