When the National Rifle Association told doctors they’re not qualified to have an opinion on gun violence by tweeting, “Someone should tell self-important anti-gun doctors to stay in their lane,” there was a backlash.
Dr. Marianne Haughey, who works in the Bronx, tweeted back, “I see no one from the @nra next to me in the trauma bay as I have cared for victims of gun violence for the past 25 years. THAT must be MY lane. COME INTO MY LANE. Tell one mother her child is dead with me, then we can talk.”
Another doctor tweeted, “Single GSW to the head as a drive by. Surprisingly little blood, but plenty of blood curdling screams from this middle schoolers mother when we told her that her baby was dead. Tell me @NRA how do I get her screams out of my head 4 years later? #ThisIsMyLane #GunControlNow”
The NRA was angry that the American College of Physicians issued a paper on firearm injuries and deaths. The paper stated, “Firearm violence continues to be a public health crisis in the United States that requires the nation’s immediate attention. Restrictions should be lifted on gun-violence research conducted by the C.D.C. and other government agencies.”
The NRA accused the doctors of being “biased” and “anti-gun.” Dr. Christine Laine, the editor in chief of Annals of Internal Medicine, replied, “Annals of Internal Medicine is not anti-gun; we are anti-bullet holes in people. And if we are biased, the bias is toward counseling our patients to reduce their risk of firearm injury and toward evidence-based solutions to the public health crisis that firearm injury has become.”
The NRA’s lane is defending the weapons that put bullet holes in people. It’s not their lane where the holes are removed, or where parents are told their children are dead.
The NRA should just park it.
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