Drunk Driving Enforcement

Driving while impaired is one of the nation's most frequently committed violent crimes, and Americans rank drunk driving as their number one highway safety concern. Each year, 42,000 people die in motor vehicle crashes, and more than 16,000 of these fatalities are alcohol or drug related. However, fatalities and injuries involving impaired driving, also known as drunk and drugged driving, are largely preventable. Although the definition of impaired driving includes drug-induced impairment, most of the research and arrest data focus on impairment caused by alcohol.

Since 1990, alcohol-related fatalities have been reduced by 25%, from 22,084 in 1990 to 16,653 in 2000. However, in more recent years, the rate of such incidents has been slowly creeping up again. But the overall reduction since 1990 is due largely to concerted efforts by both the public and private sectors, and can be attributed to factors such as the passage of stronger state and federal laws prompted by organizations such as Mothers Against Drunk Driving, tougher enforcement of these laws, the integration of technological tools to identify impaired drivers, stiffer sentences, and the creation and implementation of educational/promotional campaigns. All of these efforts have contributed to a change in public attitudes and beliefs about the dangers of drinking and drugged driving.

Despite the progress that has been made, in 2000, alcohol-related fatalities accounted for 40% of the total traffic fatalities for the year. These figures represent an average of one alcohol-related crash every 32 minutes. Approximately 1.5 million drivers were arrested in 1999 for driving under the influence of alcohol or narcotics, an arrest rate of one for every 121 licensed drivers in the United States. Recent National Highway Traffic Safety Administration statistics indicate that alcohol-related crashes cost society $40 billion per year. This conservative estimate does not include pain, suffering, or lost quality of life. About 3 in every 10 Americans will be involved in an alcohol-related crash at some point in their lives.

Impaired driving is operating a motor vehicle while under the influence of alcohol. In 34 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico, it is illegal to drive once the blood alcohol concentration (BAC) level has reached .08. Separately, these activities might be socially acceptable and legal; however, in combination, they can have devastating consequences. An alcohol-related motor vehicle crash occurs when a motor vehicle collides with a nonoccupant (e.g., a pedestrian, a bicyclist) or an object (e.g., another vehicle, a guardrail) and at least one of the drivers or nonoccupants has a positive BAC. Although research clearly documents that drinking alcohol is associated with motor vehicle crashes, it is, of course, true that some motor vehicle crashes involving positive BACs would have occurred even if no alcohol had been consumed because of the presence of other factors such as bad weather, poor road conditions, and so forth. Researchers have estimated the percentage of alco-hol-related crashes that are attributable or due to alcohol, that would not have occurred in the absence of alcohol, at various driver BAC levels. The percentages of alcohol-related crashes that are attributable to alcohol are 91% at BACs at or above .10, 44% at BACs .08 through .099, and 24% at BACs less than .08. These data help explain why many states have been reducing their per se limits from [Page 159].10 to .08. Eliminating alcohol-related crashes, especially those associated with high BACs, should substantially reduce the numbers of deaths and injuries that occur in motor vehicle-related crashes.

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