The cost of gun violence to taxpayers

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With Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle’s proposed new gun and ammunition taxes, she is drawing a link between guns and the county’s high cost of treating gunshot victims

The National Gun Victims Action Council provided some support for that position this week.

By the council’s estimate, taxpayers spent more than $5 billion each year to cover the cost of U.S. gun homicides. Here’s the arithmetic: Each gun homicide costs $400,000, times an average of 12,000 gun homicides a year.

Preckwinkle puts the cost to treat each uninsured gunshot victim at Stroger Hospital at $52,000.

Read an Oct. 29 Sun-Times story here.

Read an Oct. 9 Sun-Times editorial here.

Read the National Gun Victims Action Council statement here.

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