A week after Buffalo, 10 years after Sandy Hook, 23 years after Columbine; the places and cities change, but the story is the same—too-easy access to firearms, inaction on wildly popular, common-sense safety measures like background checks, and countless lives lost or changed forever.

As physicians and health care workers, the cold horror of this attack is  unthinkable, but it has now become commonplace. Children’s lives are routinely sacrificed, families continually destroyed, and communities forever changed because of our nation’s suicidal embrace of the warped vision of America promoted by the firearms industry and gun lobby.

 

Many states have taken action to protect its citizens from gun violence but Governor Bill Lee, the Tennessee supermajority legislature, Senator Marsha Blackburn, Senator Bill Hagerty and others have stood with the NRA and blocked state and federal gun control legislation despite the fact that all studies demonstrate that states with strong gun laws have lower gun death rates. 

 

The American Medical Association, one day after the Uvalde massacre, issued a statement which reads, in part: 

“As physicians, our mission is to heal and to maintain health. But too often the wounds we see in America today resemble the wounds seen in war. More and more it is clear no place is safe—malls, schools, movie theaters, places of worship, and grocery stores have all been targeted. Firearm injuries and deaths are preventable. And while the ideal time to act and find common-sense solutions and common ground might have been years ago, the best we can do now is act today. We call on lawmakers, leaders and advocates to say enough is enough. No more Americans should die of firearm violence. No more people should lose loved ones.” 

 

We agree.  More can be done to protect our children in their schools, their families and our communities. We call on the supermajority Tennessee Legislature to repeal the permitless carry law and pass sensible laws similar to the ones passed in Connecticut after the Sandy Hook tragedy.  We call on our Senators Blackburn and Hagerty to put aside their partisan talking points and work with their colleagues in the Senate to pass common-sense gun safety policy that most of us in Tennessee and this country agree on.  

 

Any elected officials who only send thoughts and prayers after this latest shooting are willing to sacrifice our children to protect the gun industry profits and they should be voted out in 2022 and beyond. The time to act is now - it is the right thing to do!