By Cesar Chelala

September 02, 2019 "Information Clearing House" -  If any doubts remain about the nefarious influence of the National Rifle Association (NRA) on the political life of the United States, President Donald Trump’s decision to discuss gun control measures with that organization should dispel them. The offer to discuss these measures is like asking a criminal for his weapon of choice in order to hand it over. This obsequiousness equals that of many legislators, mainly Republican, who refuse to pass effective legislation on gun control measures out of fear of losing NRA support. Scores of people stand to lose, among them a significant number of children and adolescents, whose lives end needlessly by criminal violence.

Children and teens in the United States experience much higher rates of gun deaths and injuries than in any other industrialized country. In 2016, guns killed twice as many children as did cancer; only vehicle crashes were a higher cause of death. That same year, firearm-related injuries killed 3,143 children, while cancer caused 1,893 childhood deaths.

When compared to other countries, the statistics are also surprising. In 2016, children in the U.S. were 36 times more likely to be killed by a gun than the total number of children in the other 12 wealthiest countries in the world. There is also a big difference between the U.S. and low-to-middle income countries. There were five times as many child gun deaths in the former than in the latter, according to 2016 data (the last year this information was available.) “Children in America are dying or being killed at rates that are shameful,” concluded in an editorial Edward W. Champion, the executive editor of the New England Journal of Medicine.

The consequences of gun violence are also felt in other ways. Children and teens are affected when a friend or family member is killed or harmed, or when they witness deadly gun violence. School shootings leave scores of children with post-traumatic-stress disorder, leading some to commit suicide. Many of the survivors suffer other serious psychological consequences.

The impact of gun violence is not shared equally across populations. In the U.S., African American and Latino children experience higher rates of gun violence than their white peers; they are 22 and 14 times, respectively, more likely to die by gun homicide than their white counterparts. To a large extent, this is the result of political decisions that create segregated neighborhoods and do not provide economic incentives for development.