The newly established Global Coalition for WHO Action on Gun Violence—now comprising more than 50 organisations and rapidly growing globally—has been invited to brief the WHO-convened Ending Violence Against Children (EVAC) Townhall on 3 November 2025.
Supported by a Steering Committee of globally recognised leaders in public health, gender equality, trauma care, peacebuilding, and child protection, the Coalition brings together extensive multidisciplinary expertise to address one of the world’s most preventable public-health crises.
The Global Coalition for WHO Action presentation will draw on findings from the Coalition’s new report, co-published by the Gender Centre at the Geneva Graduate Institute, the Violence, Inequality & Power (VIP) Lab at the University of San Diego, the University of Cape Town’s Division of Social and Behavioural Sciences, the Comprehensive Injury Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin, Sou da Paz (Brazil), Gun Free South Africa, and WINAD (Trinidad & Tobago). The report includes an unprecedented analysis of WHA resolutions, WHO publications, and expert interviews tracking the organisation’s engagement on firearm violence from 2000–2025.
The Coalition welcomes WHO’s longstanding leadership on violence against women and violence against children, and sees this Townhall as a timely opportunity to collaborate on a rapidly escalating child-rights and public-health concern.
Stephen Hargarten, a founding contributor to the Coalition’s work, stressed: “Firearm violence is a predictable and preventable global health threat. When we focus on children—those most vulnerable to both direct harm and long-term trauma—the case for coordinated international action becomes undeniable. The WHO and its Member States have a vital opportunity to lead.”
Firearm violence is now a leading cause of death for children and adolescents in several regions, and exposure—direct or indirect—carries lifelong consequences for health, learning, development, and wellbeing. Children are also deeply affected by the violence and coercive control they witness against mothers and caregivers: the presence of a firearm in an abusive relationship dramatically increases the risk of femicide and serious injury, heightening children’s fear, sense of insecurity, and chronic stress. These experiences undermine emotional regulation, concentration, and attachment, making firearm-related intimate-partner violence unequivocally a children’s issue.
The mental-health consequences are profound. Exposure to gun violence—whether in homes, communities, or schools—is strongly associated with anxiety, depression, sleep disturbance, post-traumatic stress, suicidality, and diminished social functioning. These effects accumulate, undermining cognitive development and executive functioning. In educational settings, gun violence leads to declines in attendance, concentration, academic performance, and grade progression. Children in affected communities experience higher dropout rates, lower graduation rates, and decreased access to stable learning environments.
The long-term economic consequences are equally stark: young people exposed to firearm violence are more likely to struggle with employment, experience reduced earnings, face instability in early adulthood, and have limited access to vocational pathways. Exposure in childhood is linked to diminished trust in institutions, higher rates of chronic illness, and ongoing mental-health challenges well into adulthood.
Firearms are also widely used in suicide globally, carrying fatality rates far higher than other methods. For adolescents—who often experience acute but short-lived crises—the presence of a gun makes an impulsive moment vastly more likely to end in death, compounding loss, trauma, and community harm.
To address these interconnected risks, the Coalition outlines several priority actions for WHO, Member States, and partners:
- Champion a World Health Assembly (WHA) Resolution on firearm violence, establishing shared standards and coordinated international action.
- Integrate firearm risk into WHO frameworks—INSPIRE, RESPECT, adolescent health, LGBTQI guidance, child protection, and commercial determinants—so guidance reflects the leading drivers of child injury and trauma.
- Develop and share guidance for Ministries of Health to strengthen trauma care, psychosocial support, safe storage initiatives, and rehabilitation.
- Improve global data and surveillance systems, including injury, femicide, youth suicide, disability, and exposure.
- Regulate gender-exploitative and youth-targeted weapons marketing, which shapes boys’ attitudes, normalises firearms, and increases risk.
- Support evidence-based national policies that reduce firearm access and enhance community-level protection.
Dean Peacock, speaking for the Coalition’s Secretariat, noted: “Countries everywhere are looking for practical ways to reduce firearm violence and protect children. The evidence is strong and the solutions are clear. A WHA resolution and full integration of firearm risks across WHO frameworks would give governments the guidance and momentum they need to act.”
The Coalition looks forward to working with WHO, Member States, and global partners to ensure that every child can grow up safe and free from the harms of firearm violence.
For more information: dean.peacock@uct.ac.za.
