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Show Drinking Drivers Get- Blame for Most Accidents It is not the reeling drunk, but the respectable "social" drinker the person rarely, if ever, visibly vis-ibly intoxicated who is the worst killer on American highways. high-ways. This conclusion, based on accident ac-cident statistics, is reported in a recent Reader's Digest article, "Driver Had Been Drinking," by Paul W, Kearney. More than half of all highway deaths involve in-volve motorists not listed as "drunken drivers," but given the milder police symbol HBD "Had Been Drinking." A growing body of evidence and opinion indicates, Kearney writes, that medical standards for measuring driver drunkenness drunken-ness (.15 per cent of alcohol in the blood proves intoxication; from .05 per cent up may suggest sug-gest it) are far too liberal. Driving Driv-ing skill actually begins to slip measurably after more than one drink or at about one fifth the level our courts consider intoxicating. intoxi-cating. Seven world medical authorities said at the Symposium Sympo-sium on Alcohol and Road Traffic Traf-fic at the University of Indiana in 1958: "A blood alcohol concentration con-centration of .05 per cent will definitely impair the driving ability of some individuals; at a concentration of .10 per cent all individuals are definitely impaired." im-paired." The typical drinker reaches the .05 per cent level with two ounces of whiskey taken within an hour. If he takes four more in the next two or three hours, he probably will reach the .15 per cent level. But even at the lower point, a driver will have difficulty in deciding what to do in an emergency involving good judgment. Although hand and food reaction time may still be good, he will take much too long deciding how to react. Also he will develop an insouciant, "so what" attitude. Of 69 drivers killed in New York City in 1957, medical analysis anal-ysis showed that 38 had been drinking. In Westchester County, N. Y., autopsies on 83 drivers in single vehicle accidents those involving just one car and no pedestrians disclosed that 69 per cent had been drinking. A similar test by Delaware State Police showed 80 per cent had been drinking. A simple key to accident prevention, pre-vention, Kearney suggests, is for the person who plans to drive later to limit himself to a drink per hour. (It goes without saying say-ing that any motorist should be a teetotaler on th eroad.) Since the average 150 pound adult will oxidize about two thirds of an ounce of whiskey in an hour, one ounce of whiskey or one bottle of beer per hour is considered safe drinking for people who are going to drive home some time later. Such an intake would hardly register in a chemical test an hour after the last drink. |