Joe Anderson, DO, FAAP is a pediatrician in Maine. He currently serves as the advocacy chair for the Maine chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

This year, I will mark 10 years practicing as a pediatrician. During my career in Maine, I have seen the impact of gun violence firsthand in our emergency room, from a toddler killed after accessing an unsecured firearm, to a teenager injured by the unintentional discharge of a gun, to countless adolescents shot in acts of interpersonal firearm violence or suicide attempts; and, in 2023, victims of the 10th-deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history.

You do not need to be a pediatrician, like me, to understand the impact that firearm-related injuries and deaths have on communities. And it is not only mass shootings like the tragedy in Lewiston, or the campus shooting that took place at Brown University in Rhode Island last month, that cause lasting physical and emotional trauma. Some Mainers live in places where gun violence is an all-too-common occurrence, affecting our children’s sense of security and well-being. Many others have lost loved ones to suicide by firearm.

Taken together, firearm injuries are the leading cause of death for children and teens in our country. But it does not need to be that way.

Our state is no stranger to firearms. In fact, Maine ranks number 16 in states with most guns per capita. It is imperative, then, that we research best practices for making gun ownership as secure as possible for the health and safety of our children.

In November, our state voted overwhelmingly to enact a “red flag law,” which will allow individuals to petition courts to have firearms removed from their family members if they are deemed to pose risks to themselves or others.

From my own experience caring for children injured by firearms, I know measures like these are effective and will save lives. However, it takes research to better understand the issue, its causes, and develop effective solutions that work for everyone.

Since the first Trump administration, Congress has supported funding for firearm injury prevention research on a bipartisan basis. These investments have helped researchers tackle understudied issues like counseling firearm safety for older adults experiencing early onset Alzheimer’s and dementia, working with parents and patients to improve the use of secure storage practices and collaborating with service members and their families to reduce risk of veteran suicides by firearm (73.5% of veteran firearms deaths are due to suicide — far above the national average).

Researching best practices for firearms is not a new or revolutionary concept. In fact, we have researched other products before with great success — like cars. Over the past several decades, federally funded research into automobile safety has made road travel safer and the death rate from automobile accidents has plummeted as a result. We can take that same strategy and apply it to firearm safety to ensure children are not killed by firearms, whether through accidents, suicide attempts or homicides.

These investments especially help children, who receive lifelong benefits from advances in research that make our communities safer, healthier and happier.

Since 2019, Congress has provided $25 million annually shared evenly between the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health for research to reduce injuries and deaths from guns.

Sen. Susan Collins recognized the importance of this research by including its funding in the joint Senate and House appropriations bill released last week, and I encourage the senator to utilize her role as chair of the Senate Committee on Appropriations to continue supporting this research as Congress finalizes the Fiscal Year 2026 appropriations bill and looks ahead to 2027 funding in the coming months.

As a pediatrician who cares deeply about the health and safety of young people in our community, I call on the entire Maine congressional delegation and all of Congress to support funding for gun violence prevention research in the final funding bill.