Mr. Jim MacMillan Discusses Gun Violence Reporting (June 3rd)

Listeners are certainly aware of never ending US gun violence.  For example, since 37, moreover 4th grade children, were shot with 19 killed in Uvalde, Texas on May 24th, there have subsequently been at least 14 subsequent mass shootings killing at least 10 and wounding another 61.   Over the past ten years, or since the Sandy Hook , there have been 950 subsequent school shootings.   Concerning federal policy, via the so called (Jay) Dickey amendment the Congress effectively banned the CDC from researching gun violence between 1996 and 2020.  Presently, it does not appear the Senate will act to pass substantive and widely popular policies designed to reduce gun violence.   As the British journalist, Dan Hodges, concluded in 2015, "in retrospect, Sandy Hook marked the end of the US gun control debate.  Once America decided killing children was bearable, it was over."

During this 36 minute conversation, Mr. MacMillan begins by providing an overview of the Center's mission and its work along with the Center's weekly newsletter, the roots of the problem, suicide reporting, his preliminary impressions regarding the Uvalde shooting, his related interaction/experience with the medical community, status regarding the Center's work informing policy reform and the specifics of his "better gun violence reporting" initiative.          

Mr. Jim MacMillan is the Founder and Director of the Philadelphia Center for Gun Violence and its parent organization, the Initiative for Better Gun Violence Reporting.  Previously, Mr. MacMillan was a Journalist in Residence at Swarthmore College, a Fellow at the Philadelphia Social Innovations Lab at the U. of Penn and a Practitioner in Residence at the Institute for Global Leadership at Tufts University.  Mr. MacMillan was also an Ochberg Fellow with the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma at Columbia University and a Knight Fellow in Medicine/Health Sciences Journalism with the Knight-Wallace Fellows at the U. of Michigan.  Previous faculty appointments include the U. of Missouri School of Journalism, Swarthmore College, NYU's Carter Journalism Institute and Klein College of Media and Communication at Temple University.  During his prior photo journalism career, Mr. MacMillian spent 17 years at the Philadelphia Daily News and with The Associated Press working in Boston and Baghdad during the war in Iraq.  His teams war reporting was awarded the Pulitzer Prize. 

Information on the Philadelphia Center for Gun Violence is at: https://www.pcgvr.org/.  

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thehealthcarepolicypodcast.com