Over the past decade mass shootings have become more and more prominent in the

United States. In 2016 in Orlando, Florida, an ISIS member killed 49 people in a gay night club.

At Sandy Hook Elementary, 20 students and 6 teachers were shot and killed. And again, in

Charleston South Carolina, 9 people were shot dead inside of a church. The people responsible

for these shootings either had mental illnesses, were on the terrorist watch list, or bought the

guns used in the shootings within the week of the massacre. The American medical made a

statement about all of the death, "With approximately 30,000 men, women and children dying

each year at the barrel of a gun in elementary schools, movie theaters, workplaces, houses of

worship and on live television, the United States faces a public health crisis of gun violence...

Our AMA 'recognizes that uncontrolled ownership and use of firearms, especially handguns, is a

serious threat to the public's health inasmuch as the weapons are one of the main causes of

intentional and unintentional injuries and deaths.' AMA policy supports legislation calling for a

waiting period before purchasing any form of firearm in the U.S., and supports requiring

background checks for all handgun purchasers (American Medical Association). If laws arent

passed to make it harder for people to get their hands on a fire arm, these mass shooting will only

become more common. These laws include not selling guns to people with mental illnesses,

people on the terrorist watch list, requiring a permit for people to purchase a gun, and have a

mandatory waiting period when trying to purchase a fire arm. All of these things seems like

common sense and yet nothing is being done to change the current gun laws in the United States.

One possible solution to the problem of gun violence in America is not allowing people

with mental illnesses to legally buy a gun. Roughly one out of every four murders have a history

of a mental illness. Even though this is not a very large number, there is a lot of risk in selling

guns to people with who are sick. But restricting these people from buying guns not only protects
the people who come in contact with this person, but it also protects the individual buying a gun.

Allowing them to buy guns poses an inordinate and needless risk to public safety (The

Editorial Board of the New York Times). There is too great of a chance that someone with a

mental illness will hurt himself or the people around him. According to the CDC, 21,334 people

die every year from suicides by fire arm. About 85 percent of suicide attempts using a gun end in

death. Many people argue that depression and mental illnesses have nothing to do with murders.

However, in all of the most recent mass shootings, people who knew the shooters all said that

they saw signs of depressions and bipolar disorders in the shooters in the days before the

shootings. With a law that restricts mentally ill people from buying guns, it would save not only

the lives of innocent bystanders, it would also lower the number of suicides by firearms.