Pandemic, pistols & pandemonium: Rise in gun violence during the COVID-19 pandemic
On March 13, 2020, President Donald Trump declared COVID-19 a national emergency. Unfortunately, as cases of COVID-19 began to skyrocket in the United States, so did cases of gun violence. The American Academy of Family Physicians defines gun violence as “homicide, violent crime, attempted suicide, suicide, and unintentional death and injury.” The mass spread of COVID-19 created capacity issues for hospitals, as Americans were being hospitalized at an exponentially-increasing