Driving deaths are up
Unsurprisingly, road traffic in 2020 was significantly depressed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, as Americans around the country sheltered at home to socially distance and reduce contact with fellow citizens.
However, driving-related fatalities did not fall by a corresponding percentage — in fact, they increased. While traffic levels rested at about 15% below comparable pre-pandemic periods throughout the year, there were 11,260 deaths in the third quarter of 2020, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
This represents a 13.1% increase, the highest quarterly increase since 2008. It’s time to sound an alarm about traffic safety.
Granted, that alarm may not be as sexy as some catchy safety phrases (like “Click it or ticket” or “Puff puff, pass the keys to a designated driver”) that adorn modern highways. (Georgia even held a contest for highway safety signs, and winners included the likes of “Wearing a seat belt makes you look thinner” for seat belt safety and “Looking at the road is a great way to stay on it” for distracted drivers. Very cheeky.)
More drivers have been clocked at speeds exceeding 100 mph, and fewer drivers are wearing seat belts. While the initial drop in traffic at the start of the pandemic cleared roads enough for drivers to sometimes get away with such behavior, this unsafe behavior seemed to continue even as traffic increased when some quarantine measures abated.
Safety officials also point to police presence as being a key variable impacting traffic fatalities. A 2018 review in the International Association of Traffic and Safety Sciences concluded: “Budget, number of sworn officers, and number of hours spent on the field are preventive measures for fatality rate,” and “The number of hours spent on the field may be the best predictor for the fatality rates.”
Significant law enforcement budget cuts around the country, whether due to loss of revenues from the coronavirus or social justice pressures to “defund the police” could indirectly contribute to the spike in traffic fatalities. More study is needed here.
What’s clear, however, is that simple precautions — wearing a seat belt, not texting while driving, observing the speed limit — would likely reduce driving-related deaths.
Nationally, numbers of traffic fatalities had been trending downward in recent years. These newest stats are a troubling reversal, and the onus for getting back on track lies with individual drivers. Emptier roads are not an excuse to pitch common sense out the window. Let’s see a return to safer.