The American Bar Association has joined eight national health care organizations to produce a joint statement that outlines measures aimed at reducing firearm injuries and deaths in the United States. The group recommends taking a public health approach to reducing gun violence.
The statement provides specific recommendations for reducing firearm-related injuries and deaths from a group of leaders that include legal, medical and public health professionals. The recommendations include:
—Universal background checks of gun purchasers.
—Elimination of physician “gag laws” that prohibit doctors from discussing a patient’s gun ownership or safe use of firearms, and warning of the dangers of firearms.
—Restriction on the manufacture and sale of military-style assault weapons and high-capacity magazines for civilian use.
—Increased research to support the reduction of firearm-related injuries and deaths.
The ABA Standing Committee on Gun Violence confirmed that the recommendations are permissible under the recent Second Amendment cases of the U.S. Supreme Court and federal courts.
In addition, the ABA Standing Committee on Gun Violence developed a report titled “Gun Violence Laws and the Second Amendment: A Report of the American Bar Association.” The report provides an examination into the Second Amendment and addresses gun violence as a public health crisis.
“The ABA has joined with eight national health care organizations to address the public health crisis of gun violence in this country and to apply public health approaches to curtailing gun violence. A significant part of the ABA’s role was to help make it clear that there are several ways to reduce gun violence that are constitutional and are safely within the law,” said ABA President William C. Hubbard.
The health professional societies made two additional recommendations:
—Support improved access to mental health care without broadly prohibiting all people with mental or substance use disorders from purchasing firearms.
—Oppose blanket reporting laws that require physicians to report patients with mental or substance use disorders, because these laws may stigmatize patients and keep them from seeking treatment.
Organizations contributing to the white paper include the American Bar Association, The American Academy of Family Physicians, American Academy of Pediatrics, American College of Emergency Physicians, American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, American College of Physicians, American College of Surgeons, and American Psychiatric Association.
The ABA Standing Committee on Gun Violence aims to address the problem of gun violence through public education, bar activation, and legislative efforts aimed at reducing gun violence and by taking on a coordinating role for lawyers active in the ABA, for its sections and divisions, state and local bars, and private bar groups.
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