Johns Hopkins gun violence researchers urge policymakers to act on gun reform
BALTIMORE -- Gun violence researchers in Baltimore argue policymakers need to consider tougher gun laws in the wake of Wednesday's shooting after Kansas City's championship parade.
A woman was killed and more than 20 others were injured Wednesday from a shooting police say appears to have stemmed from a dispute.
"I thought, 'It's another day in America,'" Dr. Cass Crifasi, Co-Director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions, said.
Crifasi says Missouri's gun laws make it easier for everybody to get firearms.
"Missouri has gone the opposite direction of the public health research," Crifasi said. "We know that when states have strong gun laws, it's much harder for people who shouldn't have guns to get them."
Missouri allows for open carry of firearms, although a permit is required within city limits.
Researchers say data show the prevalence of guns increases the likelihood a dispute or fight turns lethal.
"If people had gotten into a dispute at the parade and didn't have firearms, maybe there would have been a fist fight, maybe there would have been pushing and shoving. We don't know," Crifasi said. "When you make it easier for people to carry guns in public, you see harms to public safety, increases in violence, increases in shootings by police."
Crifasi says she had hoped more policymakers would have been open to gun reform following the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012.
"I really hope the conversation doesn't end at 'thoughts and prayers', but policy change," she said.
To review research from the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions, click here.
