Traffic deaths drop after cellphone ban

California study finds 22 per cent decline

SACRAMENTO, CALIF.— California’s nearly four-year-old ban on drivers using hand-held cellphones is saving lives, according to a University of California, Berkeley study.

The study found that overall traffic deaths dropped 22 per cent, while deaths blamed on drivers using hand-held cellphones were down 47 per cent. Deaths among drivers who use hands-free phones dropped at a similar rate.

The university’s Safe Transportation Research and Education Center examined deaths for two years before and two years after the cellphone ban took effect in July 2008. It found a similar drop in injuries attributed to drivers’ cellphone use. The number of deaths among drivers using hand-held phones fell from 100 to 53 during that period. The number of injuries dropped from 7,720 to 3,862.

The California Office of Traffic Safety, which sought the study, said deaths and injuries are declining in part because there’s an overall decrease in drivers using cellphones.

The California survey, which was released Monday and included1,801 drivers, tracked a similar finding in 2010 by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.

The institute’s survey found 44 per cent of drivers in states with cellphone bans said they don’t use their phones while driving, compared with 30 per cent in states that let drivers use hand-held phones.

Two previous studies found no overall reduction in crashes with the ban. The university said its study is the first to look specifically at crashes involving cellphone use.