Crash deaths hit 10-year highs

Bad driving habits are taking lives on the nation’s highways, with traffic fatalities on the rise in 39 states

Despite ongoing advancements in auto safety — including greater crashworthiness and the prevalence of accident avoidance systems like stability control and forward auto-braking systems — along with stricter state DUI and teen licensing provisions, the National Safety Council reports the nation’s highways are at their deadliest levels in a decade.

Preliminary figures indicate traffic fatalities shot up by 6 percent during 2016 and reached a grim total of 40,200 lives lost. Put another way, it means 12.40 lives were lost to crashes per 100,000 people last year, or 1.25 deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled. That’s a 14 percent increase over 2014’s statistics, which is the steepest twoyear escalation in over half a century.

The NSC further estimates that motor-vehicle deaths, injuries, and property damage cost the nation an estimated $432.5 billion last year in combined wage and productivity losses, medical expenses, administrative expenses, employer costs and property damage. That’s a 12 percent increase over 2015.

Why the sudden spike in traffic deaths? Part of it has to do with more cars and trucks on the road over the last few years concurrent with the nation’s economic recovery. But a great deal of the responsibility lies firmly on the shoulders of U.S. drivers. A recent NSC survey showed that while 83 percent of motorists say that safe driving is of paramount concern, 63 percent are nevertheless comfortable with speeding and 47 percent send and/or receive text messages behind the wheel (either manually or via voice command). Not only that, 13 percent of the motorist queried admitted to driving while under the influence of marijuana, with 10 percent admitting to taking the wheel after consuming too much alcohol.

“Our complacency is killing us. Americans believe there is nothing we can do to stop crashes from happening, but that isn’t true,” says Deborah A.P. Hersman, president and CEO of the National Safety Council. “The U.S. lags the rest of the developed world in addressing highway fatalities. We know what needs to be done; we just haven’t done it.

Traffic fatalities went up in 39 of 50 states (plus the District of Columbia) last year, with New Mexico’s highway death rate leading the charge with a 34 percent increase, though it should be mentioned that’s still low on the list of deadliest states at 398 lives lost. The next-largest increases were reported in Alaska (at 29 percent), Hawaii (27 percent), Iowa (26 percent), and Alabama (23 percent).

Perhaps not surprisingly, the states the NSC says suffer the most motor vehicle deaths are also among the most populated in the union. Texas, California, and Florida each suffered over 3,000 traffic fatalities during 2016. Combined, these three states account for a whopping 26 percent of all reported traffic fatalities in the U.S. during 2015.

By the same token the states having the fewest highway deaths are also among those having the fewest residents, including the District of Columbia at 28 fatalities, followed by Rhode Island at 53, and Vermont at 64. Combined they’re responsible for just 0.3 percent of U.S. highway deaths.

For its part, the NSC is calling for immediate implementation of several legislative measures designed to help cut the number of traffic fatalities, perhaps dramatically, in the coming years. These include

mandating ignition interlocks to prevent convicted drunk drivers from taking the wheel with alcohol in their systems, and completely banning all cell phone use (including hands-free calling and texting) to all drivers in all states.

The NSC is also calling for states’ seatbelt laws to be upgraded from secondary to primary enforcement, widespread use of automated traffic-camera systems to catch and penalize speeders, mandating advanced safety systems like forward auto-braking and blind spot monitoring, passing or reinstating motorcycle helmet laws and adopting graduated licensing for all drivers under 21, not just those under 18.