Through counseling and advocacy, primary care providers can play an important role in preventing firearm injury, according to experts. In a recent research letter published in JAMA Pediatrics, Eugenio Weigend Vargas, PhD, a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Michigan, and colleagues reported that from 2018 to 2022, national child and adolescent mortality rose 18.8% — more than double the from 2013 to 2017. The increase, they wrote, was driven by a 22.8% jump in deaths related to injury, mostly caused by overdoses and firearms. Dr. Vargas spoke with Healio about what this data indicates.
