According to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), driving while distracted resulted in 20 percent of all crashes in 2008. Nearly 6,000 people have died as a result of distracted driving and many more have been injured. NHTSA also reports that the younger, inexperienced drivers, who are especially prone to driving while being distracted, attributed to highest proportion of the fatalities.
Dontdriveandtext.org is a nonprofit organization that seeks to educate teens and their parents on the dangers and pitfalls of texting while driving. It says that driving while texting ranks up there in fatalities with drinking and driving.
Texting while driving is the biggest distraction for teens aside from talking on their cell phone while driving. Most teens lack awareness of the true ramifications of texting while driving or driving while distracted in general. Texting is now deeply embedded in teen culture, and working adults have embraced it, as well. Therefore, the problem arises for anyone who refuses to refrain from using technological devices while driving.
In 2007, Congress partnered with State Farm and the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia to enact National Teen Driver Safety Week in an effort to produce public and social media announcements to focus on teen driver safety. They chose October for their annual campaign month because they say statistics show that most accidents and crash fatalities occur for teen drivers in the month of October.
The battle to ensure that teens refrain from texting or talking on their cell phones while driving starts at home. Does the parent speed, text or talk on the cell phone while driving? While texting while driving is a growing epidemic affecting road safety everywhere, distraction in general is also harmful. Playing with multimedia devices while driving such as an MP3 player, CD player, or GPS system, eating, drinking and horse playing all fall under the realm of driving distractions. However, texting while driving is the most dangerous of all primarily because drivers who text are six times more likely to cause an accident than people who are intoxicated, according to NHTSA.
Although texting and driving is dangerous behavior at any age, the dangers increase if the driver is young and inexperienced.
Contact an experienced attorney to learn more about your legal options in the event that you have been injured in a car accident due to a distracted driver.
Alexandra Reed writes for Connecticut personal injury law firm, Stratton Faxon. Contact Stratton Faxon to speak with a Connecticut accident lawyer about your personal injury, wrongful death, or Connecticut malpractice case. To learn more, visit Strattonfaxon.com.
