In a word, they think they’re okay to drive. And they’re driving short distances and think they can drive carefully. Or the just don’t think about it.
That’s the results of a poll by the Traffic Injury Research Foundation. The poll was sponsored by Anheuser-Busch.
The poll revealed a smaller percentage of drivers in 2017 thought they had no alternative to alcohol-impaired driving in comparison to previous years. This may indicate that drivers are learning about alternatives to driving while impaired, such as ridesharing and safe ride programs, which have been hailed as promising countermeasures.
The three years’ worth of road Safety Monitor data collected to date (2015, 2016 and 2017) show that the number of U.S. drivers reporting alcohol-impaired driving was the highest in 2016, which is also the year with the highest number of alcohol-impaired driving fatalities.
In fact, since 2014, there have been two consecutive increases in this number from 9,943 in 2014 to 10,320 in 2015, and to 10,497 in 2016. These increases have taken place in a context of decreasing concern about the issue, both measured in relation to other societal topics as well as other road safety topics.
According to Dr. Ward Vanlaar, Chief Operating Officer of TIRF in Canada and a co-author of the study, however, there is perhaps also some good news as the 2017 RSM data reveal decreases in the prevalence of alcohol-impaired driving in comparison to 2016.
“While there is no perfect correlation between self-reported behavior and its consequences, our RSM early warning system suggests there might be a decrease in alcohol-impaired driving fatalities in 2017. Continued monitoring will be essential to inform countermeasures.”