In The Midst Of The Pandemic, Our Gun Problem Gets Worse

The chart above uses figures from FBI.gov. It shows the number of firearms background checks have been done through the NICS system in each of the last 12 months. Note the red trend line. The trend for these checks has gone up significantly in the last year.

This is only the number of checks done, not the number of guns sold. The number of guns sold is likely even higher -- since there are still many loopholes in the background check law.

One might expect that the number of mass shootings might have gone down with the social distancing because of the pandemic. Sadly, that is not the case. So far this year (according to the Gun Violence Archive), there have been 284 mass shootings in this country. That's is well above one mass shooting for every day this year (actually about 1.479 per day) -- above the rate for last year.

There has also been 21,559 gun deaths this year. That means we are well on our way to having 40,000 gun deaths this year.

The COVID-19 virus is not the only epidemic in this country. We must not forget the gun violence epidemic has not abated. We need to control both!