America's Mass Shooting Problem

School Shootings are an almost uniquely American problem. While it is true that school shootings have taken place in other countries around the world, as the map above shows no other country has experienced anywhere near the number of school shootings as the United States. 

This School Shootings by Country 2022 map claims that the USA has experienced 288 school shootings. The country with the next highest number of school shootings is Mexico, with 8. According to Everytown there has so far been 77 incidents of gunfire on school grounds in the United States in 2022, and it is still only May.

Mother Jones has been collecting data on all mass shootings in the USA since 1982 (this data is not confined to school shootings). The map above uses this data to show the location and scale of mass shootings across the country. According to Mother Jones' Guide to Mass Shootings in America in over three quarters of these incidents the guns involved were acquired legally. 

The Gun Violence Archive also collects data on gun-related violence in the USA. The Gun Violence Archive reports that there has been 214 mass shootings in the USA so far this year. So far 658 children have been killed by guns this year and 1,623 have been injured by guns. 

America's response to every mass shooting incident is to pray for the victims. Those prayers never work. Americans keep buying guns and Americans keep shooting each other. Do you want to know what does work - gun controls.

After a gunman killed 51 people in Christchurch in 2019 the New Zealand government banned most semiautomatic weapons. New Zealand also introduced a nationwide gun buyback scheme, which enabled gun owners to safely hand in their guns to the authorities. Since 2019 there have been no mass shootings in New Zealand.

In 1996 a gunman killed sixteen pupils and a teacher in Dunblane, Scotland. Following the incident the UK government outlawed the private ownership of handguns.There have been no school shootings in the UK since the private ownership of handguns was banned. 

It really isn't a difficult problem to solve. If people don't have guns they can't shoot people.