Long Island researchers: National surge in gun deaths among young

Firearm deaths nationwide among children and adolescents surged more than 40% between 2018 and 2021, according to new research published by New Hyde Park-based Northwell Health and the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research.

Gun violence overtook traffic accidents as the leading cause of death among people under the age of 19 in 2020, according to the paper, “Trends and Disparities in Firearm Deaths Among Children,” which was published Monday in the journal Pediatrics.

Dr. Chetan Sathya, the director of Northwell Health’s Center for Gun Violence Prevention and one of the authors of the paper, said the research shows a strong correlation between poverty and firearm deaths. He said the data shows that gun violence is one of the nation’s most pressing public health crises and demonstrates the need for programs that promote firearm safety and address violence as well as the root causes of inequality.

“In the operating room and across our communities, we continue to see an increase in gun violence among children, a crisis that continues to skyrocket upward,” said Sathya, who is also a trauma surgeon at Cohen Children’s Medical Center in New Hyde Park.

“Our research reiterates the need for action now," he added.

From 2018 to 2021, 20 children aged 19 and under died by firearms in Nassau and Suffolk counties, according to statistics from the CDC’s Wide-ranging Online Data for Epidemiologic Research (WONDER) database.

Sathya and his colleague Dr. Bailey Roberts of Long Island Jewish Medical Center said pediatric firearm deaths nationwide increased 41.6% between 2018 and 2021. There were 4,752 pediatric firearm deaths — 5.8 per 100,000 persons — in 2021, a 8.8% increase over the previous year.

Almost half the children killed by firearms in 2021 — 49.9% — were Black, the study found, and 84.8% were male. The vast majority — 82.6% — were between 15 and 19 years old. Nearly 64% of child firearm deaths were homicides. Black children accounted for 67.3% of those deaths.

Separately, white children accounted for 78.4% of firearm suicides.

There were worsening clusters of firearm death rates in Southern states, the report said, and increasing rates in Midwestern states from 2018 to 2021. 

“It doesn’t surprise me at all,” said Thomas Beverly, the director of the Economic Opportunity Council’s SNUG program, of the study's findings. 

The Patchogue-based EOC operates programs designed to assist low-income families and individuals.

“In some of these neighborhoods, grabbing for a gun is a learned behavior,” Beverly said.

Sathya blamed the increase in children’s gun deaths nationwide in 2020 on the emotional turmoil and financial hardships caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, which amplified inequality. Drug overdoses and substance abuse also increased during the pandemic, according to public health officials, who said annual fatal overdoses passed the 100,000 mark for the first time in 2021.

One reason why gun deaths among children have spiked, according to Colleen Creighton, the director of Brady’s End Family Fire campaign, is that there are more guns in America’s homes.

Gun purchases soared during the pandemic because people felt unsafe, Creighton said, and those anxieties were heightened by divides over George Floyd’s murder while in police custody in Minneapolis in 2020 and tensions fueled by the 2020 presidential election.

“We are seeing more demand for gun ownership that we have seen before,” she said.

Beverly and EOC official Rob ODonnell said Long Island’s dearth of public transportation makes it difficult for poor residents to get to work. Expensive housing leads to overcrowding, fueling frustration and tensions. Some residents grew up turning to violence to solve disputes or blow off steam, they said, because that is how they grew up.

“We have to teach kids early how to deal with anger, and other ways to deal with frustration,” ODonnell said. “Not just the kids, but their parents, too.”

With Arielle Martinez and Anastasia Valeeva