DC advocates call on lawmakers to take action after surgeon general declares gun violence a public health crisis

WASHINGTON — The Surgeon General declared gun violence a public health crisis this week. Now, D.C. advocates who have acknowledged it as such for years are pushing lawmakers to give this advisory teeth.

Dr. Vivek Murthy issued an advisory detailing why gun violence has reached crisis level -- and why he believes it needs to be solved through a public health lens.

He shared sobering data showing that gun violence has become the number one killer of children in the United States.

“The bullet goes so much further. The bullet hits the community. It hits, it hits everyone around," said Jawanna Hardy, who started a group to support D.C. kids called Guns Down Friday.

Fifty-four percent of American adults worry "sometimes," "almost every day," or "every day" that a loved one will become a victim of gun violence.

Suicides and homicides by firearms have been increasing.

The advisory states, though, that the cause is a combination of factors that need to be addressed holistically.

“I work in the hospital, and I also work in the community, so being a hospital based violence intervention specialist and seeing these changes, it really warmed my heart, and I feel like it's a step in the right direction," Jawanna Hardy said.

She works at Children's National Hospital and founded her own group that supports D.C. children, called Guns Down Friday.

That's how she got to know 15-year-old Maciah King-Brooks, who now serves as an ambassador for the organization.

“I feel like just keeping it in a doctor's hands is just a perfect way to guide through it. And maybe when they figure out, like, 'wow, like, it's really a health crisis that everybody getting shot,' maybe they going to, like, start to lower it down, or, like, just start to change their mindset and their ways," he said.

In 2021, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser did declare gun violence a public health crisis in the nation's capital, but advocates said there still has not been a clear solutions plan outlined.

Ryane Nickens, who founded The TraRon Center wants to make sure the same doesn't happen on the Hill.

“It's like, OK, great. Now, can we get the research to help kids who live in communities where gun violence has become a generational thing? Like, where's the research on how we treat them?" Nickens questioned. "Gun violence is not just one thing. It is not just school shootings, it's not just mass shootings, it's not just communal gun violence or suicide. It's all these things, and there are different ways to address all of these things. They all stem from different reasons. And to get to the bottom of each one, I think it has to be studied.”

Nickens listed some of the causes that she has observed in working with children. The TraRon Center helps kids to heal their trauma through art therapy.

“You've got to go to the root causes, equity in schools, affordable housing. …job training and access to jobs and a living wage and access to recreation, sports and activities for young people...and mental health and trauma support," she said. "How then do you tell a child that has experienced five to eight gun violence related incidents in their lives, and they are just 15, that there's more, and expect them to want to do more, to be able to sit in school and learn and do all the things that you know children do to as they grow. …I think the research and the treatment and how we get at that research and that treatment is one of the more important things than just the statement.”

Multiple physicians organizations joined the surgeon general's call, supporting his classification of gun violence as a public health crisis.

You can read their statements here.