Sgt. Joe Friday’s line in television show “Dragnet” was “Just the facts, ma’am, just the facts.”

So here are some facts. More Americans, 482,413, died by guns between 2014 and 2025 than U.S. military who died in the Viet Nam War, 58,209, and World War II, 405,349 (Sources, Statista & Defense Casualty Analysis System). In 2019, the U.S. gun homicide rate was 18 times the average rate in other developed countries (Source: Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation). For the third straight year, firearms killed more children and teens, ages 1 to 17, than any other cause, including car crashes and cancer (Source: Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School).

Amnesty International reports the U.S. has also witnessed a horrifying rise in mass shootings, which are typically defined as shootings where four or more victims are killed or injured. In 2022, there were 46 school shootings, more than in any year since 1999, inflicting untold harm on children who witness the gun violence or are left cowering in classrooms, trying to hide from it. In 2021, there were 683 mass shootings in the U.S., a record high.

This year, as cited by Gun Violence Archive, 887 children ages 0-17 were killed by guns. Since the Annunciation Church Catholic School shootings in Minneapolis on Aug, 27, there have been 62 incidents of guns in schools that resulted in 31 injured and four killed, including the victims at Annunciation (Editor’s note: This letter was submitted last week).

According to Everytown Research, the U.S. averaged just over 87 school shootings each year from 2013 to 2021, with an annual average of 28.4 dead and 59.6 wounded. The World Population Review shows the U.S. with 288 school shootings from 2009-2018.

So what are we going to do about it? For the schoolchildren, for the sons and daughters and parents, for anyone affected by gun violence? Just asking.