TEEN DRINKING ABUSE MAGAZINE & DRIVING
Teenage Drunk Driving Statistics
In recent times, drinking and driving has become a serious issue among teenagers in the United States. In order to drive safely, a person has to be alert, capable to make decisions based of incidents happening around and execute them. This coordination while driving becomes difficult, especially under the influence of alcohol.
Alcohol leads to loss of coordination, poor judgment, slowing down of reflexes and distortion of vision, all of which invariably lead to an accident. The statistics related to alcohol and driving indeed depict a gruesome picture about the entire phenomenon.
The statistics of drunk driving compiled by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, U. S. Department of Transportation, produce some staggering facts about drunk driving. Out of 12,998 drinking driving fatalities in the United States 1,393 were caused due to teen drinking and driving. About 28 % of teenagers killed in motor vehicle crashes were drinking either before or while they were driving. Most of the drivers forget to use their seat belts after consuming alcohol. Around 64 % of teenagers who were involved in fatal drunk driving crashes were reportedly not wearing their seat belts. The study rates motor vehicle crashes as the leading cause of deaths among teenagers. It also reported that the fatalities caused by teens drinking and driving constituted 40 % of all alcohol-related fatalities in the United States.
Drinking and driving statistics, compiled by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention( CDC), showed that more than half of the drunk driving accidents involving teenagers were reported on either Friday, Saturday or Sunday. It also showed that about half of these accidents occurred between 3:00 pm and 12:00 am. According to the studies done by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, young people are less likely to drive after drinking, but when they do they are more likely to end up crashing as they are drunk and relatively inexperienced in driving.
Since 1875, an estimated 24,560 lives have been saved due to implementation of the minimum drinking age. The legal age has been changed several times and fluctuated between 18 and 22. The current minimum age for purchasing or consuming alcohol is 21, which was implemented by all the 50 states of the United States of America in July 1988. Drunk driving stats confirm that increasing the age led to reduction in the number of accidents caused by teens drinking and driving. According to the zero tolerance law, it is illegal for any person below the age of 21 to drive with 0.02 percent or greater blood alcohol content( BAC). A study done in 12 states of the United States of America reported that the proportion of fatal accidents reduced by 20 % after these states passed the zero tolerance law.
In some people, alcohol triggers the overconfidence of being able to handle anything, while for some others, allowing or encouraging a drunk person to drive means sheer fun. Driving safety is something that just goes out of the window when under the influence. Statistics of teen drunk driving suggest that a teenage boy with BAC levels of 0.05 percent is 18 times more vulnerable to crash his vehicle than a teenage boy who hasn’ t consumed alcohol. In girls, this vulnerability increases to 54 times over her non-drinking counterpart.
On behalf of the administration, initiatives like sobriety checkpoints and legislation like zero tolerance laws have been introduced. Organizations such as Students Against Drunk Driving and Mothers Against Drunk Driving have been actively spreading awareness about the hazards of drinking and driving. Though all these efforts have decreased the number of casualties caused by teenage drunk driving, the numbers depicted in the latest statistics are still very frightening. The need of the hour is to completely curb this social menace, which is something that threatens the lives of our young loved ones.
By Abhijit NaikLast Updated: 9 / 22 / 2011
Source: www. buzzle. com / articles / teen-drinking-and-driving-factsteenage-drunk-driving-statistics. html abusemagazine. org | Illinois Winter 2014 | 19