Obama’s Budget Seeks 30 Million for Gun Violence Prevention

by Jan Morgan /Jan Morgan Media

President Obama’s Fiscal Year 2014 budget includes $30 million in new funding to “track gun violence” and to research strategies that might prevent it.

Of that new $30 million flowing to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, $10 million will support “gun violence prevention research” and $20 million will be spent on expansion of CDC’s National Violent Death Reporting System.

Here’s what the CDC budget justification (page 233) says about the $10 million for new research into “gun violence”:

In addition to the approximately 30,000 firearm-related homicides and suicides a year, more than 58,000 non-fatal firearm injuries from assault or self-harm are treated in hospital emergency departments annually. Together, each year they account for more than $35.3 billion in medical and lost productivity costs to the United States.

The President’s plan, Now is the Time, calls for public health research on gun violence to give all Americans the information they need. To address the numerous gaps in the evidence base for firearm injury prevention, CDC will use $10 million to begin conducting research into the causes and prevention of gun violence.