With the number of young people shot by guns on the rise in the US, a children's hospital in the heart of the America's capital is trying to break the cycle of violence.

In the emergency room at Children's National Hospital in Washington DC, hospital beds line the corridors as cartoons blare on television sets.

Nearby, children with the most traumatic injuries are rushed to the trauma room. These are often victims of road traffic accidents, but in recent years, more and more children have arrived with gunshot wounds. Dr Mikael Petrosyan, a paediatric trauma surgeon who has operated on victims as young as three years old, says it's a near daily occurrence.

如今，受槍傷的美國(guó)年輕人與日俱增，而一家坐落于美國(guó)首都中心區(qū)域的兒童醫(yī)院正試圖打破這個(gè)暴力循環(huán)。

在位于華盛頓城的國(guó)家兒童醫(yī)院的急診室里，病床整整齊齊排了一走廊。電視上則閃爍著動(dòng)畫(huà)片。

不遠(yuǎn)的地方，傷勢(shì)最嚴(yán)重的兒童被火速送往創(chuàng)傷室。他們常常是交通意外的受害者，但近幾年，越來(lái)越多的孩子被送進(jìn)來(lái)時(shí)身上帶著槍傷。兒科創(chuàng)傷外科醫(yī)生，Mikael Petrosyan，曾經(jīng)為低至3歲的槍擊事件受害者做手術(shù)。他說(shuō)，這幾乎就是醫(yī)院的日常。

"It's shocking, because it's senseless to me, it's mind boggling," he says.

Firearms are now the most common cause of death amongst people under 17 years old, outranking road traffic accidents. The rate of gun-related deaths amongst youths has doubled in the last decade, according to a study published in JAMA Network Open medical journal, but it has got even worse since Covid. According to Pew Research gun deaths among under 18's in the US rose by 50% between 2019-2021.

“這很令人震驚，因?yàn)閷?duì)我來(lái)說(shuō)它根本不應(yīng)該發(fā)生。簡(jiǎn)直匪夷所思?！彼f(shuō)。

槍擊超過(guò)了交通意外，成為現(xiàn)在導(dǎo)致17周歲以下的人死亡的最大的原因。根據(jù)一項(xiàng)在JAMA網(wǎng)絡(luò)開(kāi)放醫(yī)學(xué)期刊中發(fā)表的研究，在過(guò)去的幾十年里，被射殺的青少年數(shù)量翻了一倍。更有甚者，據(jù)皮尤研究中心的研究，這個(gè)數(shù)字在新冠疫情以來(lái)變得更大了。在美國(guó)，被射殺的18歲一下青少年數(shù)量在2019-2021年間上升到了原先的1.5倍。

But it's not just the physical wounds though that need treating, say experts who work with gunshot victims. Dr Petrosyan says that children who have been shot before are much more likely to be shot again, often because they go right back to the same places, and the same people, that led to the initial shooting.

"That child not only gets traumatized, physically, but also mentally," he says.

Young victims may need help getting back on the right track - whether that means enrolling in school, finding a new group of friends or getting a job - in order to break the cycle of violence.

但需要被治療的并不只是生理上的創(chuàng)傷。治療槍擊受害者的專家們說(shuō)。Petrosyan醫(yī)生表示，受到過(guò)槍擊的孩子們更有可能再一次被槍擊，而這常常是因?yàn)樗麄儠?huì)再次回到那些導(dǎo)致他們受創(chuàng)的地方以及人群之中。

“那個(gè)孩子不僅會(huì)生理上受到創(chuàng)傷，心理上也是。”他說(shuō)。

年輕的受害者們亟需有人幫助著回到正軌上——不論這意味著去上學(xué)、換一群朋友還是找到一份工作——以期打破這個(gè)暴力循環(huán)。