CDC: Firearm Deaths Grow, Disparities Widen

The rate of U.S. gun deaths surged 35% in 2020 to the highest point since 1994, with especially deadly levels for young Black men, the CDC said in a report published last week. African Americans as a whole were at least four times more likely to be killed by a gun than the overall population, and 12 times more likely than a white person, the data showed. The CDC report goes further in placing the rate of homicides caused by firearms to the highest level in 26 years, while also noting disparities based on race, ethnicity and poverty. The firearm homicide rate, measured per 100,000 people, rose from 4.6 in 2019 to 6.1 in 2020, the report said, with a strong correlation to poverty.