By: Kiernan Hopkins
The National Safety Council has conducted a study that concludes that more then a quarter of all automobile collisions in the United States are the result of inattentive driving while using a cell phone.
This National Safety Council study also estimates that 21 percent of all auto collisions in 2013 (1.2 million out of 5.7 million) were linked to the use of handheld or hands-free cell phone use. Furthermore, the National Safety Council determined that texting while driving was the cause of an additional 6 to 16 percent of the total number of auto collisions in the U.S., increasing the total percentage of collisions resulting from cell phone use from 27 to 37 percent.
Based on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration statistics, the National Safety Council estimates that there were approximately 5.69 million auto collisions total in the U.S. in 2013. The council’s study estimates that talking on the phone resulted in 1.2 million of this total number of crashes and texting lead to 341,000.
This study discovered that 9 percent of drivers during daylight hours were talking on their cell phones and 1.7 percent were texting. The National Safety Council’s study determines that drivers talking on the phone while driving are four times more likely to crash then other drivers not talking on their cell phones. It also states that drivers who are texting while driving are eight to 23 times more likely to crash then drivers not texting while driving.
President and CEO of the National Safety Council, Deborah A.P. Hersman states, “while the public understands the risks associated with distracted driving, the data shows the behavior continues — we need better education, laws and enforcement to make our roads safer for everyone.”
The National Safety Council states that it does this annual study because the usage of cell phones is under-reported in federal crash data.
The National Transportation Safety Board reports that distracted driving is currently one of the most important and difficult challenges facing the U.S. Also the National Safety Council