With far more people dying annually from gun-related causes in the United States than in other high-income countries, US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, MD, has officially declared gun violence as public health crisis on June 25, 2024. In his opinion, Murthy noted that more than half of US adults have either experienced gun violence themselves or have a family member who has. Firearms are the main cause of death in children in the US and are the weapons most often used in domestic violence against women.

By the 2024 Surgeon General’s announcement, it already had 248 mass shootings in the US — incidents in which four or more people were shot or killed, excluding the shooter — in just six months. In the previous year, there were over 650 mass shootings and more than 43,000 dead related to firearms. Mass shootings, despite the publicity they receive, account for less than 2 percent of all gun deaths in the US.

Gun deaths, that is largely preventablecontribute significantly to the increase in preventable mortality rates and continue to do so reduces life expectancy in the US. While data limitations make it difficult to calculate the precise number of firearm-related injuries, studies suggest that the number of firearm-related injuries is about double the number of reported deaths every year.

According to some estimates, gun violence cost the US around $557 billion in 2022, with $2.8 billion spent on health care costs, mental health services, and emergency services. The largest proportion of this total was made up of costs related to quality of life, pain and well-being lost to those injured or killed, and costs to families. Combined with billions in other losses, gun deaths cost approximately $274,000 per victim and each injury costs over $25,000 per patient, equaling an average cost of $1,700 per taxpayer annually.

Previously, the Commonwealth Fund compared gun deaths in the US to other high-income countriespointing consistently higher rates from the US. In the following charts, we also look at countries whose gun death rates are more comparable to US rates. The first three exhibits show how the US compares: 1) to all countries and territories around the world; 2) in a subset of countries with a similar firearm mortality rate; and 3) only in high-income countries. We also show how gun deaths in US states compare to other countries. The data comes from the Institute for Health Values ​​and Evaluations Global burden of disease study and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s WONDER database (see “How we did this study” for details).