TBA Law Blog


Posted by: Stacey Shrader Joslin on Aug 14, 2023

A new report from the Tennessee Department of Health finds that the leading external cause of death in Tennessee children is firearms, Tennessee Lookout reports. The annual report on the causes of death in children age 17 and younger shows that Tennessee children are killed by guns at a rate 36% higher than the national average. In 2021, the latest year analyzed, 67 children died by homicide; 53 of whom were Black, a rate four times as high as white children. The data, collected between 2017 and 2021, also shows that overall deaths from all causes — accidents, suicides, premature births, medical conditions and murder — is nearly twice the national average. Read more in the 2023 Child Fatality Annual Report.