Impaired Driving has New Rules
How are laws and meds affecting our ability to do basic skills, Or Over the top?
National Highway Traffic Safety Association published that impaired driving is “Prescription drugs, over-the-counter medications, and illegal drugs may cause impairment alone or in combination with each other and/or with alcohol.
Any legal or illegal drugs and alcohol, or a combination of Impaired driving puts the driver, their passengers, and other road users at risk.
this refers to the Interstate Road Transport Act 1985.
Let’s work together to share this life-saving message:
Impaired driving is illegal and deadly.
Are We All Impaired
We are advancing in technology that medication, production, and chemistry, we are becoming a drug dependent society.
Some of the changes are coming down with unfair control environments, event style testing (broad base testing, personal and objectivity).
Below is a picture of the laws and the directions it is heading.
NHTSA IN ACTION on Drugged Driving
NHTSA’s National Drug-Impaired Driving Initiative
On January 25, 2018, the U.S. Department of Transportation’s (DOT)
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) launched a new initiative to combat drug-impaired driving.
With a national opioid epidemic and States legalizing marijuana to varying degrees, NHTSA is making drug-impaired driving a top priority.
Goals include:
- Starting a national dialogue and developing strong policies;
- Launching a public awareness and education initiative to stigmatize drug-impaired driving; and
- Exploring and leveraging innovative approaches to prevent drug-impaired driving.
DRUG-IMPAIRED DRIVING SUMMIT
Drug-Impaired Driving Summit (March 15):
To kick off the new initiative, NHTSA hosted a summit with
- key stakeholders
- safety partners,
- State and local elected officials
- data and policy experts
- law enforcement and criminal justice professionals
- toxicologists
- drug recognition experts
Two expert panels described the nature of the problem and discussed ways to address it.
Law enforcement leaders shared their experiences from the streets. Scientists reported the types of drugs detected in drivers and explained how various drugs impair driving functions.
Policy experts reviewed programs and resources and discussed experience with State laws.
Safety officials and criminal justice professionals rely on methods that have proven effective for addressing the alcohol-impaired driving problem. They are uncertainty about how some of the approaches applied to drug use.
Expert panelists and participants agreed on the urgent need for a coordinated plan to address the problem.
Several best practices were presented, demonstrating the potential for making near-term progress. With new technologies are developed to identify and measure impairment by a new and rapidly changing array of drugs.
The summit identified steps it will take over the next year to better understand and address drug-impaired driving.
Steps To Understand and Address Drug-Impaired Driving
Research to Improve Our Understanding of Drug-Impaired Driving
DOT and NHTSA are teaming up with law enforcement and scientists to improve the agency’s understanding of drug-impaired driving.
Over the next 12 months, NHTSA will:
- Examine the operation of new oral fluid screening devices
- Update its fatality data collection system to get more detailed data on drug-related fatal crashes for 2018
NHTSA is working to improve the information in FARS on drug use by drivers.
In 2018 there will be small improvements
More significant improvements will happen in 2019 and 2020.
Public Awareness to Drive Individual Action
NHTSA’s mission includes
- educating people about unsafe driving behaviors
- broadening the understanding that drug-impaired driving is illegal and dangerous.
Over the next 6 months, NHTSA will:
- NHTSA will work with its partners to develop robust and effective public education tools and campaigns
- including an advertising campaign
- Pilot-test a training course for prosecutors and toxicologists.
- Helping them understand each other’s roles,
- How to work together in court
- Launch an online introductory training course to help highway safety professionals understand the drug-impaired driving
Over the next 12 months, NHTSA will:
- Develop guidance to help States strengthen their foundation for drug-impaired driving programs
- Potential legislative changes to
- test track
- inform enforcement
- prevention efforts.
Policies for Improved Enforcement
NHTSA will work to explore and leverage innovative approaches to prevent driving under the influence of drugs.
Over the next 6 months, NHTSA will:
- Explore the potential to develop an allocation model to suggest an optimal number of drug recognition experts
- Continue to support the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP)
- Continue its efforts to develop a field test for law enforcement
Marijuana and Driving Impaired
NHTSA’s Crash Risk Study assessed whether marijuana use by drivers is associated with greater risk of crashes.
The survey found that marijuana users are more likely to be involved in crashes. An increased risk may be due to the amount of marijuana and phone use, in this group is at higher risk of crashes.
marijuana users are more likely to be young men – a group already at high risk. Only serious injury and fatal crashes will be investigated.
We know that marijuana is dangerous in combined with driving a vehicle.
Studies show that marijuana
- impairs psychomotor skills
- lane tracking
- cognitive functions
(Robbe et al., 1993; Moskowitz, 1995; Hartman & Huestis, 2013),
It is unclear to what extent the to the occurrence contributes to the vehicles crashes.
Some studies have attempted to estimate the risk of driving after marijuana use (Li et al., 2012; Asbridge et al., 2012), inconclusive in terms of predicting real-world crash risk.
This Ford suit can interact to make up fell impaired.
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