Everybody has made split decisions during their teenage years, but maybe not all have lived to tell the outcome. Making one hasty decision to drink and drive could change your life and possibly the lives of others in the blink of an eye. Although the problem of teenage drinking and driving has been brought to everybody's attention, there has not been too much done to try and prevent it. There are plenty of things you can do to try and persuade teens to drive sober, such as giving teens positive role models, having parents do their duty by teaching their teens about peer pressure (saying no!) and enforcing schools to show the effects of drunk driving. Teens today have so many bad influences in their life such as negative role models. Celebrities …show more content…
Most schools do their part to educate their students that drunk driving kills, but they do not do much after that. Mlive.com reported that a high school in Sanford Michigan put on a mock car crash a few days before prom. Students were chosen to be in the “accident” and emergency responders were present to step into action. One teen was lying on the hood with blood dripping down her face while the driver, a varsity football player, was being shoved into the back of a police car for failing a sobriety test. This mock accident had a significant emotional impact on the high school students. Scenarios like this show teens how quickly their life can be affected, whether that is being the intoxicated driver or the sober passenger. According to lifeguardbreathtester.com, in 2005, 676 teens under the age of 21 were killed during prom and graduation season in alcohol related crashes. Schools should require students to take a breathalyzer test when entering and leaving activites like prom and graduation. This may be able to stop the fatality number from increasing. We cannot stop every single person from driving drunk, but what we can do is do our best to prevent it and make the consequences …show more content…
According to textinganddrivingsaftey.com, teens are more apt to have their phones twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, than to drink seven days a week. The website also states that if you are using your cellular device to shoot a quick text while driving your car, you are 23 times more likely to be involved in a crash. Some teens do not realize that one message is not as important as their life and possibly the lives of others. There has been many tv commercials from cell phone companies that show families who have been affected by this distraction. Just imagine your family being the one on tv; your family planning your funeral, crying themselves to sleep at night saying “what if I had talked to my kid about drunk driving”. What could they have done to save you. The reality is your parents can not always be there to protect you. The ultimate responsibility for your life lies in your hands and with the decisions you
Drinking and driving is one of the biggest social issues for teens across the United States. Getting behind the wheel of a vehicle after consuming alcohol is a very dangerous thing no matter what age you are. However, teens do not think about the consequences of drinking and driving until it is already too late. Many things contribute to this growing problem of teen drinking and driving. First, there is a lack of education about drinking and driving in schools today. Next, peer pressure is difficult for many teens to resist. Finally, the access that teens have to alcohol and to vehicles is not monitored. According to blah blah study, 000% of high school students admit
The actions being taken are creating sobriety checkpoints, ignition interlocks, mass media campaigns, car services, school-based instructional programs, and the upcoming innovations in self-driving cars. Sobriety checkpoints can help in a major way because they can prevent drunk driving accidents from occurring and it can also lead people to not drink or take a car service. Ignition interlocks can also be a big help because if the person in the driver’s seat has over a certain BAC then the car won’t start. Mass media campaigns also work because they show the consequences of driving drunk and the possibilities that can happen. I remember seeing mass media campaign commercials of people who drove drunk and killed someone and they ended up being jailed for years. This strongly advised me at a young age to not drive drunk when I get to the legal age of consumption. School programs can also solve this issue because it can give the students an emotional and first hand experience that will strongly advise them to not drink and drive. The thing that I think contributes most in the area that I live, to prevent drunk driving, is “Uber” and “Lyft.” Most of the time people know if they’re going to go out and drink, and if you plan to take an “Uber” or “Lyft” then you can go out and drink without having to drive home. These car services are also extremely easy to use because you can get a ride with the click of a button. With all these alternatives to drunk driving, this is a perfect time to lower the drinking age. I would lower it even further than 18, but the main reason why I didn’t decide to make it lower is because of brain development in young teenagers. These are the main reasons why the drinking age should be lowered to age 18. If people still decide to drive drunk with all these alternatives, then they’re just “stupid”, and people
Every 51 minutes in America, someone is killed in a drunk driving crash. A dangerous issue facing society today is the problem of teen drinking and driving. Currently an approximate of 10,076 people die in drunk driving crashes per year. If positive progress to ceasing this act does not happen, teens will continue to drink and drive putting everybody on the road at risk. Teens who drink and drive put everyone on the road at risk, causing serious crashes that could be preventable.
Unfortunately, some of the money was spent on high school driver education, which increased teenage driving without reducing the number of crashes per driver, thus increasing deaths” (Robertson 296).When driving while on any kind of drug can mess up your train in thought. Although people tend to lose what they was thinking before and everything else, but most of all some forget about the dangerous outcome that will happen when they are on them. Throughout the year there has been a big change in the numbers going up on crashes. There are now programs that can help them so they can get out of everything and all the drugs that you’re on (Robertson 295). They have made vast progress: based on random stops, the number of drivers with any alcohol in their system was 35.9% in 1973. By 2007, the figure had fallen to 12.4%, according to the Department of Transportation” (Gray 54).Police to this day are still trying to get people to stop drinking and driving and doing drugs and driving. There has been so many wrecks and people dying over this case. Some people do not really understand how dangerous it can be and they still continue to do it. It was becoming to the point police can not really get anyone to understand even with them being taken into prison (Gray 54). “Three published studies have examined the effects of lowered BAC laws on teenage driving after drinking and fatal car crash involvement.(n5-n7). Youths are more likely to
The sobering fact is drivers under the age of 21 are responsible for 17% of fatal alcohol related accidents, even though they represent only 10% of licensed drivers (Stim, R. Teen Drunk Driving: The Sobering Facts of Underage DUIs (n.d.). There are approximately 2000 deaths associated with under aged drinking and according to the blood alcohol content of the victims, the main contributing factor is binge drinking, averaging 5 times the legal limit. Research has also shown that more times than not, the underage drunk driving is not wearing seat belts, increasing the chances of a fatal accident. They have found that this # is 74% of the population of drunk drivers involved in fatal
Fatal car crashes have been an issue since the introduction of the automobile. Thankfully, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in an article published March 21, 2017, “The percentage of teens in high school who drink and drive by more than half since 1991” This is in part due to the MLDA Act that has restricted many new drivers from getting drunk and recklessly driving through towns. In that same article the CDC also claims, “Young drivers (ages16-20) are 17 times more likely to die in a crash when they have a blood alcohol concentration of .08% than when they have not been drinking.” Any change to the Act to lower the drinking age will only more likelihood to a fatal crash within that age group. At the Roanoke College, a private and liberal arts institute in Maryland, students complied a paper assignment with statistics of fatal car crashes due to drunk driving below the minimum drinking age. “…for the 19- and 20-year-old age cohort, after implementation of the age law, there was a startlingly and statistically significant decline (to the 4% level) in the number of driver deaths in single-vehicle nighttime accidents...” While adults and older teens would claim they could still drive sober and drink below the age of 21, the statistics show otherwise. No one can, in good thinking, lower
Imagine waking up one day and realizing the one person who you love dearly has a severe drinking problem. What about finding out that a fellow friend or family member had their life taken from them because someone made the choice to drive after drinking! What if your child’s life was abruptly ended because their friend decided it was cool to drive after having a few beers. Well the fact of the matter is drinking and Driving is one of the biggest killers of many young Americans these days.
"Every day, 28 people in the United States die in motor vehicle crashes that involve an alcohol-impaired driver. This amounts to one death every 53 minutes (Impaired Driving)." These intoxicated drivers are not only risking their own lives while unconsciously driving, but they are jeopardizing the lives of several other innocent people. As the number of deaths and injuries due to DUI-related accidents is increasing in America, more organizations are forming awareness programs, protests, and public conventions to decrease this rate and demonstrate how much of a negative impact drunk drivers have on themselves and others. Ecovia, a company in Brazil, supports this movement by creating ads that utilize visual illustrations to show that multitasking
Blood alcohol concentration (BAC) is a step of the quantity of alcohol in the blood, revealed as a portion by volume. Connections in between the quantity of alcohol in the blood and the resulting quantity of alcohol in the breath have actually been made. Based on elements noted above, an individual's blood: breath alcohol ratio can differ from 1700:1 to
Approximately one million people are injured in alcohol-related traffic crashes every year and young people, ages 16 to 24 are involved in 28% of those alcohol-related driving accidents, although they make up only 14% of the U.S. population. On any given weekend evening, one in 10 drivers on America's roads has been drinking and according to the latest statistics, in a family of five the prospect of you or someone in your family being involved in an alcohol-related motor vehicle accident in their lifetime, is an astounding 200 percent. That's a lot of tragic, meaningless deaths that could actually have been avoided.
Teen drivers have the mentality were they are untouchable when behind the wheel. But it’s obviously to much to handle for them because when it comes to the facts to many teens die a year. In 2007, 4,200 teens in the U.S aged from 15-17 were killed and 400,000 were treated in the E.R for injuries because of car accidents (“Motor vehicle safety, Teen Drivers, page 1”). This just shows how irresponsible teens are while driving. In a national survey 12.5% of all high school students rarely wear seatbelts, this just asking too get hurt in case an accident happens (“Motor vehicle safety, Teen Drivers, page 1”). This just shows how teens have a bad mentality while driving. In 2005, 54% of teen deaths occurred between 3 p.m. and midnight on a Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. This statistic shows that one more reason why a teen would want there license is to get to a party or go
My cousin was driving from her school dance when she was hit by a car the man in the other vehicle was a forty year old that was drunk My cousin’s car tossed once and wrapped around a pole. By the time the police came, my cousin was already dead. I came right after the police, when I saw her body I was about to start crying, but I just couldn’t. They picked her up as if she was a s light as feather. While she was dead in the ambulance I just was standing there with my mama nothing can ever compare to that night. Now, each year, our entire family drives to that same pole, and we put a floral wreath on it to remember her. Drunk driving is dangerous, but there are many ways kids and grownups can do to defend themselves.
Drunk driving is a really bad problem in the United States. I think it would help to prevent drunk drivers by having more severe punishments. Having these severe punishments can help people realize that drunk driving is very dangerous to the person and people around them. With these punishments it can show the citizens of America that teen drunk driving is very big issue. I suggest that the first time you are caught driving with alcohol or drugs in your system you should have your license suspended, sent to jail for a month, and have to serve about 100 hours worth of community service before getting their license back because drunk driving should not be tolerated. If found with alcohol again double the hours and the suspension of your licenses
Traffic crashes are the leading cause of death for teens and young adults. More than 5,000 young people die every year in car crashes and thousands more are injured. Drivers who are 16 years old are more than 20 times as likely to have a crash, as are other drivers. There are two main reasons why teens are at a higher for being in a car crash and lack of driving experience and their tendency to take risks while driving. Teens drive faster and do not control the car as well as more experienced drivers. Their judgment in traffic is often insufficient to avoid a crash. In addition, teens do most of their driving at night, which can be even more difficult. Standard driver's education classes include 30 hours of classroom teaching and 6 hours of behind-the-wheel training. This is not enough time to fully train a new driver. Teen drivers are more like to be influence by peers and other stresses and distractions. This can lead to reckless driving behaviors such as speeding, driving under the influence of drugs and alcohol, and not wearing safety belts. There is no safe amount that you can drink and still drive. Even one drink can influence your driving offences. “Nowadays, drunk driving has become driving while intoxicated, driving while impaired, driving while under the influence, operating while under the influence (impaired, intoxicated, or whatever), and in many
Someone in America dies every twenty-two minutes, because of an alcohol related accident. Most people feel that they will never be part of this statistic, but experts on this subject say that everyone has a forty percent chance of being in an accident with a drunk driver. Drunk driving is a serious problem that the United States, as well as the world, is trying to deal with, because it does not only effect a select few, it effects everyone. Drunk driving amongst high school students is an enormous problem that the United States is trying to cope with. Many programs have come to surface over the past few years, that educate students on this situation. MADD, mothers against drunk driving, is a non profit