The public and political outrage that followed the Newtown school shooting has largely ignored the fact that children across the country have been victims of gun violence on a regular basis.

Between 2006 and 2010 an average of two children a week were killed by firearms, according to statistics from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

During this period, 561 children under the age of 13 died as a result of gunfire. In almost each of the five years, more than 100 youths were killed: 120 in 2006; 115 in 2007; 116 in 2008; 114 in 2009; and 96 in 2010. Last year, 119 died, according to Janell Ross of the Huffington Post.

The FBI’s numbers do not include gun-related child deaths that were ruled as accidental.

“This happens on way too regular a basis and it affects families and communities—not at once, so we don't see it and we don't understand it as part of our national experience,” Daniel Webster, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, told the Associated Press.

In response to the Connecticut massacre, the National Rifle Association called for putting armed police in every school to better protect children. But Webster said children are more likely to die from guns at home or in the street.

The Associated Press reviewed more than 60 gun-related deaths of children and found not one happened at school.

-Noel Brinkerhoff

To Learn More:

FBI Stats Show Trend In U.S. Children Shot Dead (by Suzanne Gamboa and Monika Mathur, Associated Press)

Child Gun Deaths Nationwide Number Nearly 6 Newtown Massacres (by Janell Ross, Huffington Post)