Surgeon General Declares Gun Violence a Public Health Crisis

The U.S. surgeon general, Dr. Vivek Murthy, on Tuesday declared gun violence in America a public health crisis, recommending an array of preventive measures that he compared to past campaigns against smoking and traffic safety.

The step follows years of calls by health officials to view firearm deaths through the lens of health rather than politics.

The National Rifle Association has vigorously opposed this framing and promoted legislation that effectively quashed federal funding for research into gun violence for a quarter-century. The N.R.A. also unsuccessfully lobbied against Dr. Murthy’s nomination as surgeon general by Barack Obama in 2014, calling him “a serious threat to the rights of gun owners.”

Dr. Murthy’s 32-page advisory calls for an increase in funding for firearm violence prevention research; advises health workers to discuss firearm storage with patients during routine medical visits; and recommends safe storage laws, universal background checks, “red flag” laws and an assault weapons ban, among other measures.

“I’ve long believed this is a public health issue,” he said in an interview. “This issue has been politicized, has been polarized over time. But I think when we understand that this is a public health issue, we have the opportunity to take it out of the realm of politics and put it into the realm of public health.”

But public-health-based gun reform has been an uphill battle in the United States, whose political parties are lodged in a stalemate over many of the measures the report recommends, including assault weapons bans and background checks for gun buyers. Experts estimate that 400 million guns are circulating in private hands, making it nearly impossible for the government to meaningfully restrict access to them.