Nearly 6,000 guns were found in carry-on luggage at checkpoints nationwide in 2021, breaking a record set just two years earlier, according to the Transportation Security Administration.

The data are pointing to one major driver of America’s murder spike: a massive increase in gun sales in early 2020.

The number of gun deaths in America hit an all-time high in 2020, owing mostly to an increase in homicides, according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A total of 45,222 people died of gunshot wounds — a 14 percent jump from 2019 and the largest year-over-year rise on record.

The number of children and teenagers killed by gunfire has risen sharply during the coronavirus pandemic. Researchers describe the increase as a fatal consequence of rising nationwide homicide rates, untreated traumas of Covid-19 and a surge of pandemic gun-buying that is putting more children into close contact with guns — both as victims and those wielding guns.

In 2021, there were 42 acts of gun violence committed on K-12 campuses during regular hours in 2021, the most during any year since at least 1999. The nation smashed the previous record of 30, despite most schools remaining closed to in-person classes for the first two months of the year. In total, about 34,000 students were exposed to gun violence in 2021, bringing the tally since the Columbine High massacre to more than 285,000.

Hats off to the Biden/Harris Administration and the DOJ for two new rules that will help improve gun safety, especially in the area of safe storage.

As 2022 begins, the Gun Violence Archive has released its statistics for 2021 and they are, once again, awful.

Let us hope, and more importantly, WORK, for a safer 2022.

-691 mass shootings, the most since GVA started tracking in 2014

-20,658 gun deaths

-40,358 gun injuries

-24,090 gun suicides (an estimate calculated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)