AP :
Guns kill nearly 1,300 children in the United States every year, making them the third leading cause of death for those under 18 years of age, a new study has found.
The Centres of Disease Control and Prevention study published in the journal Pediatrics examined trends is national US Government data from 2002 to 2014 and found on average 5,790 children were treated for gunshot wounds each year between 2012 and 2014.
Children from southern states and the Midwest faced higher rates of firearm homicide than other parts of the country.
Nationwide, data indicated that 4.2 per cent of children in the US had witnessed a shooting in the past year. Boys accounted for 82 per cent of all child firearm deaths while African American children were some 10 times more like to die from gunshots than white and Asian American children.
Approximately 19 children per day were killed by or treated in an emergency department because of gunshot wounds.
After 20 children and six adults were shot and killed in a massacre at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut in 2012, then US president Barak Obama ramped up efforts to tighten gun control.
But his efforts to introduce measures such as universal background checks for gun buyers and a ban on assault weapons failed to pass the US congress under persistent pressure from the National Riffle Association.
