Just the facts: Gun violence in America

Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images file

People wait to be reunited with loved ones after a school shooting at Gardena High School on January 18, 2011 in Gardena, Calif. According to reports, a student had brought a gun into school in a backpack and the weapon accidentally fired, injuring two students.

By NBC News staff

As lawmakers at the state and federal level weigh various measures to stem gun violence, here are some facts and figures on guns and crime, compiled by the NBC News research department.

The big picture:

• Every year in the U.S., an average of more than 100,000 people are shot, according to The Brady Campaign To Prevent Gun Violence.
• Every day in the U.S., an average of 289 people are shot. Eighty-six of them die: 30 are murdered, 53 kill themselves, two die accidentally, and one is shot in a police intervention, the Brady Campaign reports.
• Between 2000 and 2010, a total of 335,609 people died from guns -- more than the population of St. Louis, Mo. (318,069), Pittsburgh (307,484), Cincinnati, Ohio (296,223), Newark, N.J. (277,540), and Orlando, Fla. (243,195) (sources:  U.S. Census; CDC)
• One person is killed by a firearm every 17 minutes, 87 people are killed during an average day, and 609 are killed every week. (source: CDC)

Homicides by weapon:

• Handguns comprised 72.5 percent of the firearms used in murder and non-negligent manslaughter incidents in 2011; 4.1 percent were with shotguns; 3.8 percent were with rifles; 18.5 percent were with unspecified firearms.
• 13.3 percent of homicides were done with knives or other cutting instruments. 
• 5.8 percent of homicides were from the use of hands, fists, feet, etc. (source: FBI)

Guns and kids:

• 82 children under five years old died from firearms in 2010 compared with 58 law enforcement officers killed by firearms in the line of duty (sources: CDC, FBI)
• More kids ages 0-19 died from firearms every three days in 2010 than died in the 2012 Newtown, Conn., massacre (source: CDC)
• Nearly three times more kids (15,576) were injured by firearms in 2010 than the number of U.S. soldiers (5,247) wounded in action that year in the war in Afghanistan (source: CDC, Department of Defense)
• Half of all juveniles murdered in 2010 were killed with a firearm (source: Office of Juvenile Justice & Delinquency Prevention)