Nov 18, 2014 3 min read

General Motors may be breathing a sigh of relief. It’s no longer the only car company embroiled in a recall controversy.

The recent recall of millions of vehicles made by manufacturers for defective air bags is not as egregious as GM’s ignition switch foul-up. But it calls into question the ability of automakers and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to keep motorists safe.

The federal agency said 7.8 million vehicles are potentially affected by defective air bags made by the Japanese supplier Takata. The defect can cause the air bags to explode and send shrapnel into the vehicle. Bad bags are linked to the deaths of at least three passengers and injuries to others. Honda and Toyota, automakers with reputations for quality and reliability, have recalled the largest numbers of vehicles.

Federal regulators were so ill-equipped to help consumers that NHTSA is under fire from Congress for its handling of the air bag case. The agency now faces review by the Department of Transportation.

NHTSA opened an investigation of the air bag defect after Honda issued its second recall in 2009. But it closed that investigation just six months later and did not reopen it until this year.

The agency deserves credit for warning vehicle owners, even as automakers delayed some recall notices pending the availability of supplies. But it should not have reached this point. NHTSA should use this incident to tighten oversight and close loopholes that let automakers avoid reporting defects.

When something appears amiss, such as recalls for the same issue, it likely is. Regulators should not wait for deaths to rise before they act.

Would young people wielding guns in Erie think twice about the physical and emotional damage they are inflicting on their families and friends – as well as the dangers they impose upon themselves – if they had a firsthand view of a hospital trauma team working to save a shooting victim’s life?

In Philadelphia, teenagers watch in silence as a young man volunteers to lie down on a stretcher at Temple University Hospital. After the teenager is in place, a trauma surgeon matter-of-factly explains this is the same stretcher where doctors scrambled to treat Lamont Adams after he was shot more than a dozen times outside his grandmother’s house.

The trauma doctor shows where the bullets hit the teenager, who was known for his bright smile and sense of humor. Now, he is remembered as one of Philadelphia’s many victims of gun violence. Shortly after being rushed to the emergency room, he died, three months before his 17th birthday

His grandmother, Jenny Clark, did not want Lamont’s death to be in vain. She cooperated with Temple University to help create Cradle to Grave, which tells Lamont’s story and lets young people step into his shoes by lying down on that hospital stretcher. …

In Philadelphia, gun wounds are so common that several years ago, the Philadelphia Daily News reported military doctors came to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania to learn better methods to care for wounded soldiers. “It’s a little sad that my hometown is proving to be an urban battlefield,” Dr. Pat Riley, the hospital’s chief of trauma, said at the time.

Of nine homicide victims in the city of Erie in 2014, eight were shot, including Tyshaun Thrower, 20. He was killed Oct. 24 at East 22nd and Holland streets. Many more people are treated at local hospitals for gunshot wounds that harden their youthful hearts and break the hearts of their loved ones.