More handpicked essays just for you.
The effect of drinking and driving
The effect of drinking and driving
The effects of driving under the influence
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: The effect of drinking and driving
Have a second? Fantastic. That can also be all it takes for an intoxicated individual to choose to drive while they have been drinking. Drunk drivers nearly cause 10,076 people to be killed in drunk driving crashes, 1 every 53 minutes. Such decisions can be avoided by perusing these statistics. Let alone, most people don’t perceive the actual severity of drunk driving. You don’t have a second to waste! One categorized depressant is known as alcohol. It is recognized as a drug that takes upon an individual's essential task in their body. Not to mention, a blood alcohol level chart is used to “measure” the amount of ounce of alcohol an individual has consumed. In Rich Stim’s article, he revealed, “You shouldn't rely on the accuracy of these estimates. The chart doesn’t account for all the factors that can affect BAC levels. If you’ve been drinking, it’s always best to let someone else drive.” Concerning the BAC level chart, if an individual has a BAC of 0.08% or more, it is illegal in every state to drive. Not only this but, when an individual imbibes alcohol and decides to drive, it creates an impact on driving (Stim). …show more content…
Being that, it leads to having slow reaction time, decreased vision, frivolous coordination, inhibit judgement, and reduced concentration. Therefore, not only individuals that drink and drive are endangering other people, they affect the price of the economy. In fact the result of these crashes include: medical costs, lost productivity, property damage, workplace losses, insurance administration, legal expenses, and Emergency Medical Service. For this reason, individuals put themselves at chance for creating an injury on the highway by the effects of alcohol abuse
If you limit the BAC of 0.05% its drops two drinks or less for small people and three for larger people. If a person’s Body Alcohol Content is 0.05%, it’s about 38% more likely for that person to crash than being sober and the driver’s level is 0.08% is about 169% more likely. On average every hour one person is killed and twenty people are injured. “Crushes have decreased by 50% between 1983 which was 21,113 to 2011 which was 9,878” (Brown).
The facts are plain and simple, that alcohol and driving do not mix. About three in every ten Americans will be involved in an alcohol related crash at some time in their lives. Every single injury and death caused by drunk driving is totally preventable. To curb this national travesty, concerned Americans need to examine the problems, the effects, and the solutions to drunk driving. First of all, America has had a problem with drunk driving since Ford perfected the assembly line. Alcoholism is a problem in and of itself, but combined with driving can have a wide range of effects. The consequences of this reckless behavior can include a first time DUI or licenses suspension; a small fender bender, or worst of all a deadly crash. Most drivers that have only one or two drinks feel fine, and assume they are in control, which is irresponsible and dangerous. Alcohol is a depressant that slows down the body's ability to react and impairs judgment. To drive well, you need to be able to have a quick reaction time to avoid accidents. Unfortunately, people continue to drink and drive. However,...
Another problem lawmakers face in their attempt to lower the harm caused by drunk drivers is that simply lowering the blood alcohol content for a ...
“Drink the first. Sip the second slowly. Skip the third. The speedway ends at the cemetery” (Rockne). Every day, almost 30 people in the United States die in motor vehicle crashes that involve an alcohol-impaired driver. This amounts to one death every 48 minutes. The annual cost of alcohol related crashes totals more than 51 billion. In Recent discussions of drunk driving, a controversial issue has been whether the driving while intoxicated laws should be increased due to the amount tax payers are paying for drunk driving crashes. On the one hand. Some argue that the driving laws for driving drunk should remain the same and not change. From this perspective the laws about driving under the influence should greatly increase to be stricter, this will help decrease the death rate per year in the United States. On the other hand, however others argue that the laws about driving while drunk are already too strict and should remain unchanged. In sum, then, the issue is whether the laws about driving drunk should be greatly increased to be more effective, or remain unchanged. Because drunk driving can result in unnecessary and premature deaths, unsafe roadways, billions of dollars spent on taxpayers due to DUI’S, and losing a loved one. Drunk driving laws should be altered to be more efficient.
Driving under the influence is measured by a person’s blood alcohol level (BAC). BAC is determined by the concentration of alcohol in the bloodstream. Individual counties and states have their own legal level on blood alcohol percentages that they measure a person’s BAC to determine if they are intoxicated while behind the wheel. “Everywhere in the United States it is illegal to drive with a BAC of 0.08% or higher” (DUI Foundation).
The most obvious cause of drunken driving contains a blood alcohol content above the legal limit, while operating a motor vehicle (Thomson, 2001). Another cause of drunken driving is due to the fact that drivers may believe that they are less drunk than they actually are (ReachOut). Other causes of drunken driving are that the driver may contain false confidence about his driving skills and alcohol suppresses the ability to make rational decisions (ReachOut). Lastly, one big issue that causes drunken driving is peer pressure. This occurs when the driver’s peers are pressuring the driver to take them somewhere (ReachOut). With all of these causes comes several
We can conclude that drunk driving affects us all even if we aren’t the ones drinking and driving. Drunk driving is an ancient problem that has been going on way too long. The effects that is has not only on the driver, but on the entire community are endless. But together we can all join efforts to try and reduce drunk driving to a minimum. You never know when drunk driving is going to affect you or your family so helping to stop this social problem will help you as well.
In an attempt to combat the issue of DUIs, a national minimum BAC level of 0.02 has also been set for drivers under age twenty one and has reportedly saved hundreds of lives for drivers between the ages of eighteen to twenty years. Educational programs in schools and communities focused on the advantages of using “designated drivers” as well as public education and lobbying groups; such as Mothers against Drunk Driving (MADD) and Students Against Drunk Driving (SADD) have also yielded positive effects in the reduction of DUIs (Levinthal, 2011).
The combination of driving an automobile after drinking a significant amount of alcohol has been recognized as a serious problem since the motor car was invented in the 1880s. By 1910, the law in the United States had already codified drunk driving as a misdemeanor offence. Prohibitionists used the danger created by mixing alcohol and driving as a key point in their argument in favor of the eighteenth amendment, as a result of which the sale, manufacture and transportation of alcohol was banned between 1920 and 1933. Apparently lessons were not learned and many decades later drunk driving has been called one of the most serious problems confronting America today” (Kinkade). This should not be a problem for any country as individuals should be able to control their drinking behavior.
Driving under the influence is one of the most common and dangerous situations in which anyone can be or be placed. Drinking and driving is a serious offence that can cause someone to be physically harm or even killed. Not only are you putting yourself at risk but you are also risking the lives of passengers in the car as well as any other car and occupants sharing the road with you. Many people believe that increasing fines for drunk driving offenders will play a compelling role in cutting down the occurrences of driving under the influence. However, while harsher DUI laws will look effective on paper, they will not make a significant step in the fight against drunk driving. Although there is a law enforced for drinking and driving in the
Alcohol is something that people use to help with multiply different things and some studies have shown that alcohol may help protect our bodies from cardiovascular disease. Alcohol does have side effects to our health the surroundings around us and can cause violence, vehicle crashes and even suicide. Alcohol does have an effect on people that many social drinkers may not realize. Many people usually have tried alcohol around 13 years of age and high school students consume more wine coolers that are sold in the U.S. and they drink more than 1 billion beers a year. To understand the effects of alcohol, it begins with the brain. It is a curiosity as to why people feel the need to drink and drive. The way the brain works while influenced with alcohol has always fascinated me. Drinking and driving is one of the biggest decisions that alcohol leads to. The National Public Services Research Institute (NHTSA) did a study on 600 people who admitted driving while under the influence of alcohol. They described in detail the decisions they made leading up to the occurrence of driving while impaired like whether to take part in a drinking event, how to get to the event, how much to drink, and how to get home. The people being interviewed revealed more than 2,000 individual decisions that led to alcohol impaired driving. The decisions were then broken down into several categories as shown on the graph attached. Little is known as to what leads people to continue to drinking and driving. But as research shows, people do think, prior to drinking, how they will get home. It’s after they have already had been drinking that they decide to get behind the wheel.
Imagine being in a bar with a few of your good friends. Everyone is drinking and having a good time. Your are going to leave and go home, but you friends won't let you because they know the dangers of driving after having a few drinks. Instead they ca ll a cab to give you a ride home. You would be extremely lucky to have such smart friends. Drunk driving is a very serious problem in our society today, but it is becomming socially unacceptable causing the numbers of alcohol related traffic fatalites t o decline considerably.
Drunk driving is extremely impactful on the lives of you and others. While drinking and driving, you are not just endangering yourself, you are also endangering the lives of others. The driver of the car does not just control the car with their hands and feet. They need their brain to function properly so that you are able to react to objects on the road quicker and control the car. If you drink then drive/ drink while driving. Alcohol affects your brain in many ways that inhibit your ability to drive. Alcohol will affect your reaction time, it slows your reflexes which decrease your ability to react to objects on the road. It affects your vision, in can impair your color perception, and night vision. It slows down the movement in the muscles in your eye causing your visual perception to change. Alcohol affects your ability to track. You will not be able to judge the position of cars ahead of you, you won’t be able to judge the
Alcohol consumption not only does harm to the drinker, sometimes it also hurts the innocent people in a terrible way: drunk driving. Alcohol affects you by changing your judgments, depth perception as well as vital motor skills required to drive safely. Without a clear mind, immeasurable
Many people in the United States enjoy a drink of their favorite alcoholic beverage. It could be a nice ice cold beer after a hard day of work or going to the bar and enjoying a few shots or mixed drinks with friends. Drinking alcohol is a common way to mingle with friends and take the edge off a difficult day. However, there are dangers involved with alcohol since it does dampen the body’s ability to cope with new information. Alcohol becomes a poison to the body when consumed in large quantities. The biggest danger is not to the driver after they become inebriated, but comes to anyone the drunk driver comes in contact with. A sober person can be dangerous just by being distracted, but a drunk driver’s ability to cope with changing situations and distractions is one of the biggest hazards on today’s roads. Some individuals believe that they are not as impaired as what they are led to believe from government ads and the many videos that show what can happen to someone who is drinking and driving. Although, there are many policies in place to advocate against drunk driving, there are those who would endanger themselves and others with their thoughtless actions when they jump into the driver’s seat of a vehicle. Drinking and driving should never be combined because a person who has been drinking does not have the ability to use all mental faculties unimpaired, many people have been killed, injured, or psychologically hurt by a drunk driver, many men and women do not know the difference weight and gender have on the body’s ability to process alcohol, and the financial and legal trouble that is awaiting for those convicted by a DUI.