Alcohol-impaired driving is the largest single contributor to traffic fatalities in the U.S. On average, a drunken driver kills one person every 49 minutes and injures someone else every 90 seconds.
Drunken driving fatalities, which make up about 30 percent of all traffic fatalities, have also risen two years in a row. To stop this deadly trend, the common-sense and responsible approach is to employ data-driven solutions that reduce drunken driving crashes.
Instead of working to solve this public health and safety crisis, the American Beverage Institute, or ABI, which represents members of the alcohol industry, has resumed its attack against lowering the legal limit of impaired driving from 0.08 to 0.05 percent blood alcohol content, or BAC. Perpetuating misinformation and dismissing a proven, lifesaving solution is irresponsible and deadly.
An opinion piece published in the Washington Examiner on April 3, 2018, “Utah’s illogical .05 blood alcohol content drunk driving law,” claimed that Utah’s new law lowering the legal limit of impaired driving to 0.05 percent BAC “won’t save lives.” However, a significant body of research, including a recent, comprehensive study from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, or NAS, has shown the opposite — that if all states adopted 0.05 percent BAC laws, more than 1,500 lives could be saved each year.
Contrary to ABI’s assertion that a driver at a 0.05 percent BAC lacks “meaningful impairment,” research shows that at 0.05 percent BAC, a person has difficulty steering and experiences reduced coordination, reduced ability to track moving objects, and reduced response to emergency driving situations.
ABI also baselessly claims that a 0.05 percent BAC law would distract law enforcement from going after drivers who are “dangerously impaired.” This defies logic. Multiple studies from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, or NHTSA, and other institutions have found that lowering the legal alcohol limit from 0.10 to 0.08 percent BAC had no adverse impact on the police or courts, and in fact reduced drunk driving at all levels of impairment, including “dangerously impaired.” In fact, NHTSA has gone so far as to say that the same should happen when legal impairment limits are lowered from 0.08 to 0.05 percent BAC.
If ABI’s arguments feel like deja vu, it’s because they used the same tactics when states across the nation adopted 0.08 percent BAC limits. The downward adjustment successfully decreased the number of impaired driving incidents on our roads and was associated with an 18 percent decline in the proportion of fatal crashes involving a driver whose BAC was 0.15 or greater.
Utah is a leader when it comes to eradicating drunk driving. The state was the first to adopt 0.08 percent BAC limits and is now the first to lower the limit to 0.05 percent. However, Utah is not alone in embracing a 0.05 percent BAC limit. In addition to receiving endorsement from NAS, NHTSA, and the National Transportation Safety Board, Utah has joined more than 90 countries around the world that have adopted similar laws. In Europe and Australia, studies found drunken driving crashes that resulted in fatalities and injuries decreased by at least 5 to 8 percent, and up to 18 percent, after adopting a 0.05 percent BAC limit. Interestingly, studies also found that lower BAC limits do not affect alcohol consumption, just drunken driving.
ABI has a history of portraying any attempt to curb drunken driving as radical and ineffective when the reverse is true. Drunken driving laws similar to Utah’s new law are in place in most industrialized nations and are backed by years of real-world data showing that they reduce alcohol-impaired driving and prevent deaths and injuries.
Drunken driving is a plague that killed nearly 10,500 people and injured 290,000 more in 2016 alone. These tragic, preventable crashes have also resulted in $201 billion in comprehensive costs to society. The data is clear and convincing. Lowering BAC limits to 0.05 percent will act as a deterrent to drunken driving and will save lives.
On one thing, we truly hope ABI is right: that Utah is merely the “tip of the spear,” and that every state and the District of Columbia follow Utah’s lead and adopt a 0.05 percent BAC limit.
Catherine Chase is the president of Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety. Deborah Hersman is the president and chief executive officer of the National Safety Council.
