Can We Talk About Gun Violence and Not Talk About Guns?

Our good friend Khalil has just sent me a report issued by the New Mexico Department of Health which evaluates the demographics of individuals recently presenting in state hospitals for injuries committed with the use of guns. You can download the report here.

The very detailed report was put together because New Mexico appears to be a state which has experienced an alarming increase in intentional gun injuries, and it is presumed that getting a better understanding for who is shot by a gun will make a public health response to the problem more effective in the days to come.

The report follows guidelines that were developed for another Health Department report which sets out a statewide strategic plan for preventing gun injuries which was published in 2021 and can be downloaded here.

The report on who gets shot by guns in New Mexico finds that white residents of the state have not seen any significant increase as gun violence victimization over the last several years. But there had been a significant increase in gun injuries among Hispanics, Native Americans, and blacks since 2017, although the jump in all three racial groups was much higher from, 2017 to 2018 than during the Pandemic years.

Th really bad news about gun violence demographics concerns the state resident population which are classified as black. Since 2019, blacks have represented more than 40% of all gun violence victims, but as a proportion of the overall state population…