The Gift of Sober Driving

Through the vacation season, many people stay up for get-togethers with family and friends. Sadly, holidays may also be a harmful time for alcohol- and drug-related site visitors incidents. SAMHSA is observing Nationwide Impaired Driving Prevention Month in December to boost consciousness of this lethal but preventable drawback.

Because the early Nineteen Eighties, public coverage modifications, faculty and neighborhood interventions, and grassroots advocacy have considerably decreased alcohol-related driving fatalities. But, driving impaired (by alcohol or different medicine) continues to take lives.

• About 30 p.c of all site visitors fatalities in the USA contain a driver who’s alcohol impaired. Every day, about 32 folks in the USA die in a crash by which not less than one driver is alcohol impaired. That’s one particular person each 45 minutes.^1,2
• 56 p.c of drivers who’re severely injured or killed in a crash examined constructive for not less than one drug, in line with preliminary knowledge from an ongoing research. ^3,4

Alcohol, Different Medication, and Medicines

We all know loads about how alcohol impairs the flexibility to drive — affecting our imaginative and prescient, response instances, judgement, and talent to multi-task. Driving beneath the affect of different medicine can have equally lethal penalties. ^5,6

• Some prescription and over-the-counter drugs may cause excessive drowsiness, dizziness, and different unwanted effects. If there’s a warning on the medicine about “working heavy equipment,” that features driving a car.
• Marijuana can sluggish response time, impair judgment of time and distance, and reduce coordination.
• Opioids may cause drowsiness and impair cognitive perform.
• Cocaine and methamphetamines can result in aggressive and reckless driving.

It’s unlawful all over the place in the USA to drive inebriated, marijuana, opioids, methamphetamines, or any probably impairing drug. ⁷

• This contains prescribed and over-the-counter drugs.
• Even in states the place marijuana legal guidelines have modified, it’s nonetheless unlawful to drive beneath the affect of that drug.

What You Can Do

All of us need to rejoice safely. That begins with renewing our dedication to sober driving and supporting our family members and communities to do the identical. Only one drink (or substance) can have an effect on an individual’s driving.

• If you happen to’re attending a gathering the place alcohol or different substances might be served, plan beforehand to get house safely.
  • You’ll be able to designate a sober driver or organize for a taxi or experience share (to and out of your vacation spot).
  • Discuss prematurely with family and friends about planning to forestall impaired driving.
• Don’t let others get behind the wheel in the event that they’re beneath the affect.
  • Take their keys and organize a sober experience house or have them keep the night time.
• If you happen to host a celebration the place alcohol or different substances might be served:
  • Ask your visitors to make a plan to get house safely.
  • Supply substance-free drinks.
  • Be certain all visitors depart with a sober driver.
• At all times put on a seat belt.
  • Ensure that everybody within the car wears a seat belt.
• If you happen to see an impaired driver on the highway, pull over and get in touch with native regulation enforcement.

For the Children in Your Life

Talk with your kids about impaired driving.

• Allow them to know:
  • It’s by no means okay to get behind the wheel of a motorized vehicle whereas beneath the affect.
  • Getting in a automotive with somebody who has been ingesting or utilizing medicine is harmful.
• Assist children plan an exit technique, to keep away from accepting a experience from somebody beneath the affect.

Assets:

• The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) provides information and suggestions associated to alcohol- and drug-impaired driving.
  • NHTSA’s traffic safety marketing website provides campaigns (with social media playbooks, graphics, information releases, reality sheets, and so forth.) on alcohol- and drug-impaired driving, together with content material for holidays all year long.
• The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) proposes laws, know-how, and testing to forestall alcohol- and different drug-impaired driving.
• SAMHSA’s “Implementing Community-Level Policies to Prevent Alcohol Misuse” (November 2022) is an evidence-based useful resource information that gives insurance policies to forestall alcohol misuse, implementation examples, and well being fairness issues.
• Impaired Driving: Talk With Your Kids (PDF | 417 KB). This reality sheet (from SAMHSA’s Talk. They Hear You.® marketing campaign) supplies tips about speaking with children, together with serving to them construct an exit plan for an unsafe state of affairs.
• SAMHSA’s Communities Talk contains an replace about impaired driving by younger drivers in the course of the holidays.
• SAMHSA’s National Helpline supplies referrals to native therapy, assist teams, and assets. It’s confidential and free, for people or households going through substance misuse and/or psychological well being points. Name 24/7 at 800-662-HELP (4357) or TTY: 800-487-4889.
• A few of us expertise the vacation blues. For anybody occupied with suicide, anxious a couple of good friend or cherished one, or in want of emotional assist, name or textual content 988. The 988 Suicide & Disaster Lifeline is on the market 24/7.

This vacation season — and all yr lengthy — we every play a job in stopping impaired driving and its tragic penalties. Sober driving is a present that we will every give to ourselves and one another.

¹Nationwide Freeway Visitors Security Administration. Drunk Driving. Retrieved at www.nhtsa.gov/risky-driving/drunk-driving on Nov. 15, 2022.

²Nationwide Heart for Statistics and Evaluation (2022, April). Alcohol-impaired driving: 2020 knowledge (Visitors Security Details. Report No. DOT HS 813 294). Nationwide Freeway Visitors Security Administration. https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/813294 (PDF | 541 KB)

³Nationwide Freeway Visitors Security Administration. Drug-Impaired Driving. Retrieved at www.nhtsa.gov/risky-driving/drug-impaired-driving on Nov. 15, 2022.

⁴ Workplace of Behavioral Security Analysis. (2021, June). Replace to particular experiences on site visitors security in the course of the COVID-19 public well being emergency: Fourth quarter knowledge (Report No. DOT HS 813 135). Nationwide Freeway Visitors Security Administration. https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/56125

⁵ Nationwide Institute on Drug Abuse, Nationwide Institutes of Well being, U.S. Division of Well being and Human Providers. (2019, December). Drugged Driving DrugFacts. Retrieved at https://nida.nih.gov/publications/drugfacts/drugged-driving on Nov. 15, 2022.

⁶Nationwide Freeway Visitors Security Administration. Drug-Impaired Driving. Retrieved at www.nhtsa.gov/risky-driving/drug-impaired-driving on Nov. 15, 2022.

⁷ Nationwide Freeway Visitors Security Administration. Drug-Impaired Driving. Retrieved at www.nhtsa.gov/risky-driving/drug-impaired-driving on Nov. 15, 2022.