STRAIGHT TALK LAW: ALCOHOL AND AUTO ACCIDENTS

Drunk Drivers and Severe Personal Injury

By Jason Epstein

As any personal injury lawyer knows, alcohol is a large contributor to auto accidents and wrongful deaths. As a matter of fact, research shows that it is a factor in at least 40% of all auto and motorcycle accidents and causes roughly 13,000 wrongful deaths a year.

The good news is that drunk driving seems to be on the decline in America over the past few decades. A recent survey showed that roughly 2.2 percent of drivers on the road had a blood-alcohol content that would classify them as intoxicated in all 50 states.

That figure is down from 7.5 percent in 1973 – which indicates a major behavior adjustment has occurred in the last three decades. This can only help lower the rate of auto and motorcycle accidents, not to mention personal injury and wrongful death suits.

The more troubling news is that, when the more recent survey was done, the drivers were tested for drug usage for the first time. An alarming 16.3% of nighttime weekend drivers tested positive for drugs – including marijuana (8.6 percent), cocaine (3.9 percent) and over-the-counter and prescription drugs (3.9 percent).
That could mean we’ve merely traded one major cause of auto accidents for another. It’s also been proven that another recent trend, texting while driving, causes more auto accidents than drunk driving.

Another interesting new study conducted by doctors at the Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles finds an interesting wrinkle to the deadly combination of drinking and auto accidents – drunk drivers who end up with serious personal injury may have a better chance of survival simply because of the alcohol they’ve consumed.

38,000 patients who sustained moderate to severe traumatic brain injuries, many of them as a result of auto accidents, were used in the research. 38 percent had alcohol in their blood at the time the personal injury occurred – and those patients had a lower risk of dying of their injuries than those who hadn’t been drinking. Overall, 9.7 percent of people who hadn’t been drinking died after a brain injury, compared with 7.7 percent of those with alcohol in their blood.

This should certainly not be taken as encouragement to drink and drive. “This study really brings up more questions than it answers,” commented study coauthor Ali Salim, M.D. to CNN. “It’s a bad thing to say alcohol is good, especially since it’s responsible for so many of these injuries.”

Remember, if you’re involved in an auto or motorcycle accident where personal injury or wrongful death is involved, consult with an attorney immediately. You may not need a lawyer’s services, but it’s important to be sure before you agree to anything with insurance companies.

For more free “Straight Talk Law” information, please visit my website at www.straighttalklaw.com , where you can order free books on Washington auto accidents, auto insurance, and other valuable legal information, offered as a public service by myself and my law practice in Seattle, Washington.