Cell Phones as Dangerous as Driving Drunk

Cell phones are as dangerous
as driving drunk, study says

Does your novice teen driver really need anything to focus on besides traffic and the road conditions? Of course not.

Drive Alive campaign research shows that a vast majority of Allen County teen drivers surveyed regularly talk on a cell phone while driving. That should put a scare into all of us. The risk of having a traffic accident while using a cell phone is the same as that while driving drunk, according to a study in The New England Journal of Medicine. Researchers found that cell phone users are four times more likely to get into traffic accidents than those who do not use them.

Nationally, the number of teens and young adults talking on a cell phone while driving went up again last year, according to government research released in March 2005. The research identified the percentage of teen drivers AT ANY GIVEN MOMENT that were driving while talking on a cell phone. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) survey found that hand-held cell phone use among drivers between the ages of 16 and 24 increased to 8 percent in 2004 from 5 percent in 2002. The rate stood at 3 percent in 2000. The rate of cell phone use for drivers of all ages was the same 8 percent in 2004. That means that at any given moment in the United States last year, an estimated 8 percent of all motorists, or about 1.2 million drivers, were talking on cell phones while behind the wheel, the survey found. That compared to 6 percent in 2002 and 4 percent in 2000.

Frankly, it's dangerous for drivers of any age to drive while talking on a phone. And studies have shown that hands-free phones are no safer - the danger is the fact that the driver's mind is elsewhere. But what's bad for adults is horrible for novice, inexperienced teenage drivers.

The National Transportation Safety Board has recommended that novice drivers be prohibited from using cell phones while behind the wheel. Good idea. There's no such law here, but shouldn't you make that the law of your own household, for your teen driver?

New York, New Jersey and Washington, D.C., prohibit drivers from using cell phones without hands-free technology. A law banning drivers 18 and younger from using any type of cell phone is working its way through the Virginia legislature.

Don't wait for the laws to catch up with this dangerous situation. Set down the law for your teen driver: No use of the cell phone unless the car is parked safely in a parking lot. Is that too much to ask of your teen if it can help keep him or her alive? You decide.