Gun Violence is a Public Health Crisis

Let me know what you think about this video. What's it take to be a mentor with big brothers, big sisters? It takes 30 minutes in a cup of coffee, a video game, best 2 out of 3. It takes sharing thumbs up emojis, clapping emojis, and loaded nachos at halftime. That's how you make an impact on a young kid's life. So go on, share a few hours a month, because mentorship may sound huge, but the truth is, it takes little to be big. To learn more, volunteer or donate, go to bebignow.org. Please note, this episode contains descriptions of suicide, homicide, and domestic violence. We should not be as a country, be distinctive, because we have a statistic where guns are the leading cause of death for kids. Gun violence in America is at a crisis point. On average, 125 people in the U.S. are killed by guns, and more than 200 are wounded every day. And that's right, it remains the leading cause of death for children and teens. The magnitude of this problem is staggering, so it's easy to throw up your hands and feel kind of hopeless. But this February, something special happened in New York City. There are tremendous reasons to be optimistic. We're seeing firearm homicide rates come down. Public awareness on this is an all-time high. The interventions that we're rolling out have never been more supported. Health care leaders, gun violence survivors, physicians, community members, and faith leaders gathered for the annual gun violence prevention forum, hosted by Northwell Health. So I want to say a welcome to everybody. Thank you for being here. I also want to say a special thanks. This groundbreaking summit is treating gun violence for what it truly is, a public health crisis. That's why, in his opening remarks this year, Northwell Health CEO Michael Dowling said this issue transcends politics. It should never be a partisan issue when it comes to the lives and the future of our kids. When it comes to the well-being of families, when it comes to building solid, decent communities. The goal is to elevate the national conversation around gun violence as a true public health emergency. And I think that optimism and urgency is exactly what we need right now. Quite frankly, it's what we leave behind that matters. We can talk a lot about what we do each day, but what do we leave behind when we're no longer here? A better place. A better place for our kids to live. Hi, I'm your host, Stephanie Woodles-Wax. None of us can escape the headlines about gun violence in this country. They've become terrifyingly normal. And just speaking from personal experience, the idea that one of my kids might not make it home one day keeps me up at night. That's why learning about Northwell Health's approach to gun violence prevention was so hopeful. While hospitals typically just deal with the aftermath of gun violence, Northwell Health, the largest health care provider in New York is flipping the script. They're collecting data, researching risk factors, and creating interventions that prevent gun violence from happening. Pretty revolutionary stuff. Today, we're taking you inside Northwell's gun violence prevention forum to give you a peek into that important work. Picture this. Over 150 leaders from all over the country, gathering in New York City, plus thousands more joining virtually. These are the folks really steeped in this work, survivors, public health officials and physicians. What brought me here today is a desire to meet other people who are committed to combating the cycle of violence. As physicians, how can we not have a responsibility to take this on? It's the easiest decision we can make. It's to prioritize this as a public health issue. We notice the public health crisis and we need health systems at the front of the fight, not in the background. It's a passion because we need to take care of our kids. It's an event with heavy hitters, too. Bill Clinton, Michael Bloomberg and Gabby Giffords have all attended in the past. Everyone, regardless of job title or party lines, has a seat at the table. I'm the former Deputy Director for the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention. I lost my brother to guns two aside eight years ago. I'm the Executive Director of the Duke Center for Firearms Law in Durham, North Carolina. I'm a volunteer with Mom's Demand Action. I'm a Community Outreach/Hospital Responder Fund on North-West. I'm the Executive Director for Liffre, USA, which is the country's largest faith-based gun violence prevention network in the country. I'm a pediatric surgeon and I'm the Director of the North-Wall Health Center for Gun Violence Prevention. Two standouts and attendants were Dr. Chase and Sathia and Dr. Jose Prince. Both pediatric trauma surgeons at Cohen Children's Medical Center. Folks have normalized, right, the fact that like, mass shootings and devastation occur. I mean, Sandy Hook is often referred to as a pivotal moment in this country. But people have normalized this. Dr. Sathia knows this all too well. He's also the Director of North-Wall Health Center for Gun Violence Prevention. In their work, both he and Dr. Prince have seen the impact of gun violence firsthand. This is much more than a clinical problem, much more than a scientific thing to understand what bleeding does to the body. I think that our voice is an important voice to add to support those who lost loved ones because of a firearm and those who survived after a firearm. That's why they're here at the forum, to share their perspective as physicians, promote gun violence prevention and elevate the stories of gun violence survivors. So next we're going to welcome Amity Dewey to the stage. At the forum, Dr. Sathia moderated a conversation with Amity Dewey, a 25-year-old gun violence survivor. She's actually a North-Wall patient and she took the stage to share her story. It's just incredible to see what you've done in the advocacy space and how you tell that story. Where do you want to begin? Well, I'd like to say I'm definitely not a New Yorker, I'm from Michigan, Boner-Race. These days, Amity is a student majoring in psychology, who plans on becoming a trauma therapist. But back in 2018, she was a regular teenager growing up in Michigan, a competitive cheerleader at Midland High School and a self-described country girl. My family and also me, we're very avid hunters, you know, deer, I mean anything muskrat, you name it, we've done it, you know, and so I grew up, you know, knowing guns can be used for sport but also for, you know, other dangerous things and I was taught at a very young age, my parents informed me of that. As a high school senior, Amity and her mom lived with her stepdad, she says he was often aggressive and dealt with mental health issues. But he was not getting the proper help that he needed and so an incident happened and he completely snapped. It was January 2018, Amity and her mom had just arrived at the Grand Rapids Airport in Michigan. They'd been on a weeklong cruise in the Bahamas and the Cayman Islands, a trip celebrating her 18th birthday. Amity's stepdad picked them up and about 20 minutes into the drive home, he veered off to the side of the highway and stopped the car. And yep, he had the gun out and he got me first and I passed out and so he thought he got me and then he shot my mother and then he killed himself. And when I came to, my vision was pure black and my ears are ringing. I had no idea what was going on so I just, there's two things in my mind, like there's no way I'm going to die. I'm freshly 18. I mean, day before, there's no, I'm not going to die, no, no, I got my whole life ahead of me. And I need to get help. Amity tried to ask Siri to call 911 and yell out for help, but it was difficult to speak with her injuries. Her stepfather had shot her in the face at close range with a shotgun. The slug narrowly missed her brain but damaged both of her eyes, her jaw and half her face. And how she summoned the strength to climb into the front seat, flashed the car lights and honk the horn, but no one stopped to help. And so I get out of the car, I lost lots, lots of blood, but I was still moving from the I was shocking adrenaline and I. I kept going. I literally didn't stop until a semi almost hit me. I was so close to the highway. Just trying to get help. I was told that three people called in. One semi truck driver saw me because I was trying to weigh people down. Still, no one stopped. It was icy cold outside, only about negative nine degrees. After I couldn't fight anymore, I laid back down and I told myself you know, this is how I'm going to die at 18. That's that's how I thought I was going to go. And I was sad and heartbroken and I didn't want to I didn't want it to end. I want to keep fighting. Eventually, a deputy arrived at the scene and Amity was rushed to the hospital. Now I have really good care. My doctors are amazing. I definitely wanted to shout out to my my reconstructive surgeons. You know, in in this world, we talked about it a little bit. You know, things like kindness and positivity are often lacking. You know, and you've somehow maintained just this incredible energy and positivity. What drives you? Honestly, I'm a very stubborn woman. I am very stubborn. And so when someone tells me you can't, I look at them and say, "Watch me, I will." That's stubbornness helped Amity get through two months in the hospital in over 20 surgeries. She lost one of her eyes, her upper jaw, and has heavy scarring across her face. And of course, there's an emotional toll too. She lives with ongoing night terrors and flashbacks. It's a lifelong recovery. But it hasn't stopped her from speaking out as an advocate for gun safety. I know in Michigan, in particular, there's been a big push by the governor to focus on red flag laws or extremist protection laws. You want to talk a little bit about that? Yes. There was an incident back in 2015. I was 15 years old and my stepfather showed some aggression. Okay, not so. He showed aggression. And I feel if that law was an effect, then I could have went someplace and all the firearms would have got taken out of the house. Red flag laws, also called extreme risk protection laws. Keep guns out of the hands of those who may harm themselves or others. Michigan governor, Gretchen Whitmer, signed one into law in 2023. Five years after Amity was shot. But what if Michigan had a red flag law on the books at the time? Maybe it could have protected Amity and her mom. What if law enforcement had mental health resources? Maybe Amity's stepdad could have gotten help he needed. We'll never know for sure. But that's why Amity shares her story of survival. So this kind of violence doesn't happen again. This is an entire room full of supporters and we're all one family now. What are some of your parting thoughts? What would you like folks here to walk away with after this day? Well, I'm just, I mean, when you set your mind to something, you know, you can do it and never give up. There's always hope. There's always light at the end. There's always light at the end of that tunnel. There always is. Even when you think there isn't. And sometimes, you know, the dark days can be dark. But you know, them good days, though. Like when I get back home, I'm going to go see my niece. She's going to run up and give me a big old hug, you know. And it's moments like that. That make the hard days a little, it's a little better. So, never give up. Never, ever, ever give up. Thank you so much, Amity. Thank you. You know, we can't wait to continue the work collectively and I think we're all tremendously inspired. So, thank you so much. When Amity stepped off the stage, she instantly burst into tears. But she wasn't crying in defeat. She was triumphant. You could see the immense pride she felt, sharing her harrowing story in front of a live audience. Stories of survival like hers are powerful because this is where we can find common ground as a country. Nearly everyone agrees there are practical ways to prevent tragedies, whether through safe storage or creating a vital pause between someone in crisis and access to a gun. When we come back, we've got another panel from the gun violence prevention forum. This one about what we can all agree on. That's after the break. If there is one thing I am happy to invest in, it is getting a good night's sleep. I need it. And Quince makes it easy to bring a little everyday luxury into your nighttime routine. Or maybe just find a thoughtful gift for someone on your list. I recently picked up the Bambo sheets from Quince and I'm just so impressed. They are incredibly smooth and comfortable. And honestly, getting into bed at the end of a long day has become something I'm looking forward to even more. It's such a simple upgrade, but it makes my whole bedtime routine feel a little more luxurious. 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Not fear. Teens can tell when you're exaggerating and they tune out. Ask questions. Listen. It's not one big talk. It's a series of small ones. And morning teens, what not to use, doesn't teach them what to do instead. Helping them build healthy ways to handle pressure gives them better options. The new drug talk is free, science-backed, and made to help parents start these conversations. Visit thenewdrugtalk.org. Let's agree to disagree. We've definitely all said this at one point or another, right? It's a convenient way to end that awkward conversation with your in-laws or your neighbors when things start to get a little heated. It's the polite way to say, "We're not going to see eye to eye, and if I have to talk with you about this for one more minute, I will lose it." Some conversations just don't feel worth it. But for an issue like gun violence, we can't afford to drop it. We need to keep the conversation going. But how do we do that when it feels like there is no common ground on an issue as seemingly polarizing as guns? We're paying for our new campaign today, agree to agree. We launched a new campaign today really focusing on shining a light on the fact that guns are the number one killer of kids and teens in our country. And that actually when you do your research and you talk to Americans, parents, gun owners, non-gun owners, there are many more things that we agree on than we don't. Michelle Hillman is the chief campaign development officer of the Add Council. It's a non-profit group that works to tackle big social issues through media and marketing. They were at the forum talking all about how to get more people invested in the conversation on gun violence. A lot of times people say, "You know, I'm going to agree to disagree when you don't get along or you don't see something the same way." And that really ends a conversation. And what we learned in our research is the idea of agreeing to agree really unlocks a conversation and starts us talking about this issue in a new way. Hillman says that based on their research and surveys, there are just so many aspects of gun violence that people actually do agree on. We know that 80% of people agree that guns should be stored safely. We know that 84% of Americans agree that there should be a temporary pause between someone in crisis and access to a firearm. And we know that 8 in 10 Americans agree that having more productive conversations around gun violence could really help us change the social norm. These are not insignificant things, but when we don't talk about guns, we don't even know what we might agree on. Michelle and the Add Council want to change the perception around guns to help people see them as less of a scary thing to avoid bringing up at the dinner table and something we can all talk about with our families, our neighbors, and even at our kiddos' play dates. It doesn't need to be that awkward. We bring your child over for a play date and you say, "Would you pee nuts in the house? Jimmy's allergic to peanuts. It should be just as simple to ask if there's a gun in the house and if it's stored safely." And this is something that we need to talk about because people are afraid for their kids. They go to school every day and they're not sure what's going to happen. And that's just not the way that we want to live. So we're really trying to move people to action. Conversation really is the first step and first stage in this campaign. Maurem, Michelle, and the ad counsel unveiled a new ad meant to bring awareness to gun violence and how we can make a change. It featured kids staging a debate on gun violence as their parents watched. Michelle says these were real kids and real parents. "Studge, think about it. Do we really want to blame all of this on the community? Our friends, our doctors, and our teachers?" "No." "Well, I completely disagree." "I'm not going to listen to points that are completely ridiculous." "The point of inquiry, do you guys even realize that the number one killer of children and teens are gun injuries? Why are we finding about this?" "You're probably starting to realize now. This is not a debate. This is a message to you all to start a conversation right now. We yield our time." The ad was powerful, and it's part of a larger public campaign from the ad counsel focused on helping people find common ground to help reduce the impact of gun violence on children in the US. The campaign, called Agree to Agree, shares lots of resource guides on their website for how to have this conversation. But the work doesn't stop there. There are also spotlighting community violence intervention initiatives that are making neighborhood safer and disrupting the cycle of violence. It's helping to change the narrative of gun violence from inevitable to preventable. Plus, they're building a digital resource hub for health care providers, giving them the resources they need to talk with patients about how to store firearm safely. Another big part of this work is about being more inclusive about who is having these conversations. It shouldn't just be parents and gun owners. It needs to include people in healthcare, the very people who treat these gun injuries. At the forum, Michelle spoke with two physicians about this very issue. Dr. Mason Turner, he's the Senior Medical Director, Enterprise Behavioral Health Clinical Program at Enter Mountain Healthcare, and Dr. Jose Prince, who you heard from briefly earlier. "So much of what we're doing with our campaign is really trying to lean into the common ground that we do have and to get people to talk more and just start these conversations. Can you talk a little bit about just the role of conversation and where that fits into making our way through this process?" As a physician, I was trained at a time where we were basically told that we had the expertise, we knew we were doing. We were going to recommend a treatment course to our patients that no longer works. And I'm not sure it ever really worked. We have to have a conversation, understand the perspective of the person sitting across from us, the parents, the kid, and tailor our recommendations with our team to what that individual family and child needs. Dr. Turner says it's not just about the wound, it's about the way we think about guns in our society, and how as doctors, they need to bring that into their work with patients. "I think whenever we're working with kids in any setting, whether it's in the emergency room in the outpatient clinics, don't understand where that family system is supporting and how they're not supporting the kid as well, how we can actually talk with the parents and say, have you thought about things a little bit differently? Maybe you need to think about those firearms at home and how you're considering are they locked, both for the benefit of your own kids, but also others that come over. But the conversation is really important." Sometimes we just need to hear a doctor say it right to our face. I mean, I know when I go to my doctor's appointments, it's like, "I already know I'm not sleeping eight to ten hours a night, and I know I'm not eating enough green things that grow from the ground." But then the doctor will tell me that diet can really impact cholesterol, and I leave feeling like I need to head straight to the farmer's market and totally stock up. My point is I think hearing a medical doctor bring up gun safety would really make me think about it. Dr. Prince also talked about how doctors can become so desensitized to these issues because of how much trauma they see daily. And they're expected to just move on to the next patient despite that trauma. Captain Sully landed a plane in the Hudson, and nobody then picked him up and said, "Actually, the 430 flight needs to take off. You seem to be free now." But that's what we do. I have vivid memories of, especially in that training phase, of having a body bag wheeled away as I was then starting the next patient's care. How do you do that, right, and so part of that is locking it away. As the years go by, and I think locking it away doesn't really then help bring voice to the reality that we see, and I think that's why healthcare has a space. Dr. Prince says that surgeons need to do less compartmentalizing and come at this issue more holistically. Basically, doctors need to view treatment, not just medically, but also in terms of how they're looking at the family and community their patients are a part of, and sometimes that work can start with looking at your own life experiences as well. We talked a little bit last night about, you know, the conversation side of this and the personal side of doing this work and how that wasn't something that necessarily you learned in medical school. We just talked a little bit about some of that work and empathy and the personal side of this for you. I have family members who have died from gun suicide. I've had a big family, cousins who've gone to prison because of a use of a firearm which made the sentence even greater. I have a son who's at school and make pretend bubble in the South Side of Chicago. I've had my middle son come in as an mocked up for a mass shooting event that we drill at the Children's Hospital. Think about the irony and the weirdness. And my daughter started school this year with three days in a row with snipers and police on the roof because of swatting. It's just not a normal way to be. And we need to keep reminding ourselves it's not normal. We don't have to accept it. It's all part of shifting how we talk about and view gun violence. To see it as something we can all individually and collectively change because change is possible even if things might feel bleak today. We've seen it with other issues in the past like smoking and wearing a seat belt. You know, in the world that I grew up in with the Cuban father with a cigar, smoking was so prevalent that that is not the world we're in and I grew up not wearing a seat belt in a car. We can change things that are complicated and when we listen to the voice of the young people and hear what they're asking us to do and we can agree to work together with them and for all of our benefit. That's what gives me hope. It's the next generation. When we come back, Dr. Prince and his colleague, Dr. Chaitan Sathia, share some real examples of progress. Hey, it's Julia Louis-Dreyfus from The Wise Are Than Me podcast among other things and I've got a little holiday wisdom for you. Being during the holidays means lots of cooking and that means your trash is going to be full of smelly, rotting food, yuck. So here's the wisdom. Get a mill food recycler. I did. We've had hours for years and it has totally transformed our kitchen. It's unbelievable how much less waste and less odor there is now. Plus, it's so easy to use. You toss in basically any food you don't eat, peels, pits, meat, dairy bones. Last year we put in a whole turkey carcass, really. While you sleep, mill automatically dries and grinds all your food waste down to about a fifth of its size. That means at night you can fill it after a big, elaborate dinner and by morning they'll be room for breakfast. Nothing rots, nothing stinks, no fruit flies. 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One of the biggest reasons that I have optimism, that we have optimism that we do keep pushing forward is the impact that we're able to make on the families of survivors or survivors themselves. Not long after Northwell's gun violence prevention forum wrapped up, I spoke with Dr. Sathya and Dr. Prince, who you heard from earlier. They're both pediatric surgeons at Coen Children's Medical Center and the kind of physicians going above and beyond the call of duty. Sure, you can find them in the OR saving lives, but they're also doing research supporting public health in their communities and speaking out about gun violence prevention. And maybe you've even seen them on TV. They were featured in the Netflix docuseries Emergency and why see. which gives viewers a look behind the scenes at the life-saving work they do every day. - We're gonna fight as hard as we can. (dramatic music) - So you can imagine I was a little bit star-struck. But once we got to talking, I really just wanted to know how their work, especially the fact that they often operate on kids with gunshot wounds, affects them as parents. Staff, I have three young girls. And I know my evolution as a pediatric surgeon, my girls are only six, four, and 18 months. When I initially started training as a pediatric surgeon in Chicago, where I saw an absolute, a rages amount of children and babies being shot. And you just have this horrific experience taking families through such a traumatic journey. And I know that after I had my youngest, sorry, my oldest, at the time, during my fellowship, my look and viewpoint among the kids that I treated and what their parents were going through, fundamentally changed. It just makes it that much more sensitive. And it was absolutely a pivotal moment for me personally to activate on an issue like this, gun violence prevention, or many of the other issues, right? That are families of the kids we treat face. And I can tell you now, four or five years later, every year becomes a little bit more challenging because just last week, I was with three families who lost kids in Massachusetts. We're interacting with these families all the time and you can't help but think about your own kids. When you come home cherishing these little moments, all our kids go to school, right? All our kids are at risk. And so it does, in many ways, interestingly, I think become more difficult. But it's also a rallying call to do more. - I'm wondering, how do you approach discussions with patients and their families that come to you, let's say, before that terrible news, that come to you after a bullet injury, right? Like how do you support the family? Who's going through that? Who's sitting in the waiting room? Absolutely terrified. And then obviously, how do you break that terrible news to a family if the patient doesn't make it? - Yeah, you know, it gets incredibly hard to tell families that they are losing a loved one to a preventable issue. And universally, those families never think that it's gonna happen to them, right? We're not talking about families that always live in a community that's riddled by violence, right? We're talking about communities that live anywhere in the country. And so it's just the horrific, unimaginable thing to keep racing for. Like Dr. Sathia, Dr. Prince has learned how to approach these hard conversations with families. And it's given him a window into the many different forms of gun violence. - I think it looks very different, depending on what brings us into that moment for that family. That conversation often looks very different for the parents of a three-year-old who found dad's gun and shot the sibling. The teenager who was walking out of school and got caught up in gun violence that wasn't even directed to them, that shock looks very different than for the family that knows that their child has been caught up with friends or people that they don't want them around. They've been trying to do everything they can to change their world. That's a different conversation. So each of these episodes, each of these encounters for these families really describe the complexity of where firearms live in our American world, how families encounter the impact of firearms and the injuries and the death that they lead behind. And then for us as surgeons, what am I walking into? And obviously sometimes you don't know. You really, you just know that this person came in. And the story might take quite a while to find out and sort itself out. - Okay, I'd like to move to your work at Northwell Health. So tell me about Northwell's Center for Gun Violence Prevention. I mean, you're dealing with the aftermath all the time as we've been talking about in this conversation. But how does this work allow you to take a more preventative approach? Because that's what we're talking about here. - So Northwell Health is the largest health system in New York, right? We have nearly over an hour, 100,000 employees, many, many hospitals. And our CEO, Michael Dowling, in 2019, said that he wanted our system to prioritize taking on gun violence prevention. At the same level that we take on cancer prevention, heart disease prevention, maternal mortality, and other healthcare and public health issues. So that's when we actually founded the Center for Gun Violence Prevention here in Northwell Health. We're very focused on a system wide approach to this epidemic, whether it be suicide, unintentional injuries, mass shootings, or interpersonal violence. As you know, we serve all fight burrows, Long Island, very diverse communities. So we do see it all, right? We see kids coming in with failed suicide attempts, unintentional injuries, being shot while they're walking down the street, you name it. And so this has really required us to reframe this as a public health issue, and approaches for many different angles. You know, we work with law enforcement, gun owners, schools in our community. We work with lawmakers to implement public health policies. We do a lot of research. One of note is we were very fortunate to get one of the first NIH grants on this topic back in 2019. And we started the first ever universal screening program for a gun violence risk. So if you come into Northwell Health with belly pain, a headache, anything, you're gonna get questions about smoking, right? Risk factors, exercise, drowning avoidance, seat belts, mental health risk factors. But now you get questions about gun violence risk. So that's something we roll out. We screen nearly 100,000 patients in our ED settings because of that now in another 150,000 ambulatory. Screening hundreds of thousands of patients for firearm risk is wildly impressive. Can you imagine the impact of this kind of prevention work if we could implement it on a nationwide level? Only 10 states in the country require gun buyers to have any kind of firearm training, unfortunately. So educating people about the risks and promoting safe storage from an everyday space like the doctor's office is a major step forward. But they're not satisfied to limit this work to New York. They are convening health systems across the country. - So we have a coalition of 600 health systems from 38 states that we brought together. We have a CEO council. It's very focused on this. We're doing new work with the eye count. And so as you know, on public awareness, which we can get into a little bit more. But we're really trying to tackle this from a healthcare industry standpoint to get health systems across the country activated. - We're also the largest provider of healthcare for children in New York state. And this is the leading cause of death for children in America. So how can any healthcare organization not tackle this? And I think that's the rallying call. It's not politics, it's about the wellbeing of children. - It's all part of normalizing conversations about firearm injury risk due to access or violence risk. If an issue around access comes up, it opens up a conversation about firearm safety counseling, gun locks and community resources. If violence comes up as an issue, they can help people get in contact with social work resources and community violence intervention resources that help break the cycle of violence. - When you think about the work that you're doing for gun violence prevention, is there, I'm sure it's like one step forward, two steps back, right? There's so much, like I think one of you said earlier, you're seeing it again and again and again and again every day, is there a particular moment or experience that comes to mind that makes you think, yes, what we're doing is really making a difference. We are making progress here. - Yeah, I'll just kick us out. Particular efforts, yeah, honestly, I think even at our last forum, that when we meet survivors and families and we start to understand the impact that we've had either through our interventions or through our advocacy work or just being a listening board or them to support the organizations, that in itself gives us a lot of hope because we actually fundamentally see how that impacts and saves lives. And one story that I commonly reference as well was that we had a teenager shot and killed maybe a couple of years ago. And this is just one example of many, right? But trying to highlight a point, her older brother, 14-year-old, he said he lived a life of hopelessness. He had nothing to look forward to, never had hope. Him and his friends, most of his family have been killed by guns. He really had no future. He thought, and he came in and simply, you know, saw what we did as surgeons. He started to meet nurses. He shadowed, he came into the hospital. And you know, he's now in his way to going to nursing school. And he brought four friends with him, all of whom never would have imagined a life without violence. And I think you start to see how we all have a role to play, right? It doesn't matter where you sit. It doesn't matter if you work at a healthcare organization or if you're in a community there are many ways to tackle this issue. And that's really kind of pivotal moments that give us hope. - I could talk to you for lots longer, but I'm gonna land the plane here. What can listeners do with the information and the stories they hear at the forum, right? Like what do you hope comes out of this event? What can I do if I'm listening? - Yeah, I would, depending on the listener, I would say it started home. If you have a firearm, is it safely secured? And do you understand what that means? Is there someone at home that you were? worried about who might be in a state of crisis or close to a state of crisis that you wouldn't want to have access to that firearm. I think if you're in a position in your community as a community leader or your school to think about what can you speak to the common ground around protecting your children and how we think about working together. And then obviously at a national level, where do you join into the conversation around what is in the best interests of the well-being of our children. I think I would go from there and preventgunviolence.com is the name of our website. There's the link to the learning collaborative, the research, the data, the prior forums are recorded there. There's a lot of information that we want to make as much as possible available to everyone. Look, this issue affects every single person in our country, whether you're a gun owner or not. That's exactly why we need to treat this issue as it truly is, a public health crisis that we're going to have to work together to solve. Super practical solutions from community violence prevention to promoting safe storage practices and supporting red flag laws aren't political statements. These are common sense initiatives. And let me just say, this approach full of compassion and care for our communities was everywhere at the gun violence prevention forum. I came here to be inspired to connect to see what I can bring back to our community and Baltimore. I had enough experiences as a practicing pediatrician where I just got pissed off enough to realize that something needed to be done. For too long, we've looked at gun violence as simply a crime crisis and not a health crisis. I want to see what role I can play to be helpful in making more people aware of the need for stopping gun violence, killing children. For my family, thinking about bipartisan ways that we can address the scourge is critical for the country. I mean, listen, we've got surgeons literally stepping out of the O.R. to speak up about what they're seeing. And it's reassuring to think that at the end of the day, we all want to see fewer deaths and injuries from firearms. Here's Northwell House CEO again, Michael Dowling. One day, our kids will hopefully because of the work done by everybody here, we live in an environment where it's going to be much safer to walk the streets and not have to worry going to school and not have to be worrying walking at dark street. Imagine! If today's conversations moved you and you want to learn more, definitely check out PreventGunBilance.com/Resources and agree to agree.org. Those links will also be in the show notes, along with resources for domestic violence intervention. This episode is presented by Northwell Health. I'm your host, Stephanie Whittles-Wax. The series is produced by Hannah Boomer-Shine. Our supervising producer is Moona Danish, mixing in sound design by Ivan Karayev. Jackie Danziger is our VP of partnerships and production. Production support from Maggie Krauschor. Executive producers are Stephanie Whittles-Wax and Jessica Kordova-Kramer. Help others find our show by leaving us a rating and writing a review. Follow good things wherever you get your podcasts and listen ad-free on Amazon Music with your Prime Membership. Thanks for listening, we'll see you next week.