Description/Abstract
Gun violence worsened substantially during the COVID-19 pandemic. This brief summarizes findings from a study using weekly gun violence casualty data from 2016-2021 for 304 U.S. counties from the Gun Violence Archive and COVID-19 policy data from county-level measures of activity restrictions and masking requirements. The authors find that policies requiring masking and activity restrictions were associated with significant increases in gun violence. Indoor masking requirements were linked to a 28% increase in gun violence, while activity restrictions were associated with a 4.2% increase.
Document Type
Research Brief
Keywords
COVID-19, COVID-19 policies, gun violence, public health
Disciplines
COVID-19 | Public Health | Public Policy
Date
1-27-2026
Language
English
Acknowledgements
Research reported in this study was supported by funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) (U01DA055972). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of NIDA or NIH. The authors thank Alyssa Kirk for copyediting and formatting assistance.
Funder(s)
National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH)
Funding ID
(U01DA055972)
Recommended Citation
Recommended Citation Wolf, Douglas A., Wiemers, Emily W., Gutin, Iliya, Karas Montez, Jennifer, and Monnat, Shannon M. (2025). Pandemic Mask Mandates and Closures Were Linked to Increased Gun Violence. Lerner Center Population Health Research Brief Series. Research Brief #140. Accessed at: https://doi.org/10.14305/rt.lerner.2026.2.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
