Curbing Gun Violence Through Public Health

Aspen Ideas to Go

Despite the deeply tragic, terrifying and high-profile nature of gun violence, the United States has not been able to make significant progress on the problem. The arguments on all sides are exhaustingly familiar, and so is the lack of governmental and societal action. In the meantime, more and more people are dying—researchers say more than 45,000 a year. A group of passionate health care providers and public health professionals are urging us to look at the issue in a different light, and think about how the country’s gun-owning and gun-despising populations can actually work together to save lives. Physician and Brown University professor Megan Ranney joins former U.S. surgeon general and anesthesiologist Jerome Adams and physician and program director of the American Foundation for Firearm Injury Reduction in Medicine (AFFIRM) at the Aspen Institute, Christopher Barsotti for a spirited talk at Aspen Ideas: Health. Each has firsthand experience treating people impacted by gun violence, and they share the ways they’ve employed a public health approach—emphasizing care over punishment—to reduce harm. Could their underused methods work in more parts of the country, and make a dent in this seemingly intractable issue? Elizabeth Cohen, senior medical correspondent for CNN, moderates the conversation.

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