MADD (and NHTSA) grossly overexaggerate [motorists.org] their claims [madd.org] of "drunk driving accidents," which are really alcohol-related accidents (a misleading statistic used by NHTSA [dot.gov]). Did you know that if you, while 100% sober, hit a drunk pedestrian, it counts as an alcohol-related accident? Or did you know that if you get in an accident and EVERYONE is sober (driver, pedestrian, passengers), you can still be counted as alcohol-related due to the statistical correction [dot.gov] that NHTSA uses, since only 63% of drivers [dot.gov] are tested for their BAC level!
MADD claims that 0.08 BAC reduction saves lives, yet a study by NHTSA found no proof of such reduction [dot.gov] after North Carolina enacted the lower BAC limit: "There appears to have been little clear effect of the lower BAC limit in North Carolina. Survey data
indicate that the general public believes the new law was well-publicized. Although awareness of the new
lower limit was not particularly high nearly 18 months after the law took effect, frequent drinkers did
evidence a substantial degree of awareness that the law had changed and about what the new BAC limit
was. As is typical in North Carolina, enforcement of the lower limit was vigorous and strict."
MADD wants to lower the BAC limit lower and lower, to 0.05. It claims victory over the 0.08 law over the previous 0.10 standard. However, it has been found [uiowa.edu] that "the
relative risk [of being in a traffic accident while using a cell-phone] is similar to the
hazard associated with driving with a blood alcohol level at the legal limit." The legal limit in that paper was 0.10 BAC. Another interesting note is that "These data also call into question driving regulations that prohibit handheld
cell-phones and permit hands-free cell-phones, because no significant differences in
the impairments caused by these two cellular devices were found.", but that's another topic of conversation.
Point is, why do they want to keep lowering the BAC when it has been shown that the vast majority [dot.gov] of drunk driving accidents occurs with drivers with over 0.10 BAC, and that below that, it's as risky as using a cell phone? Why is MADD targeting low-BAC-level drivers, such as 0.08 (and as they hope 0.05), with huge fines, property confiscation, loss of driver license, and obscene insurance surcharges? MADD wants to bully states [www.ridl.us] into the 0.08 BAC law by passing legislation that threatens their funding.
Furthermore, when NHTSA's accident data was loaded in a database and independent statistics [www.ridl.us] were ran on it, the massive exaggerations were exposed. Quote from the previous link: "Through the use of this tool we were able to discover that across the entire country NHTSA nearly doubles the number of instances of drunk drivers. And this is prior to them implementing their "Multiple Imputation" methodology which adds in more numbers for "unknowns"." Take the stats on my state [www.ridl.us], Massachusetts. While NHTSA claimed that there were 160 drunk drivers, 113 of those drivers were listed with no proof!
So there you have it. Twisted statistics (they are careful to say "accidents related to alcohol," but everyday man reads as "drunk drivers"), constant agenda to lower BAC more and more despite the lack of proof.
One last lie commonly perpetuated by MADD (and NHTSA) is are the year-to-year comparison stats. Every year MADD claims [madd.org] that we have more and more alcohol-related (a deliberately misleading statistic [www.ridl.us]) accidents: 17,380 in 2000, 17,400 in 2001, 17,419 in 2002. The outcry is "more and more people are dying!" The truth is that there are more cars on the road in 2002 than there were in 2000. And obviously, the more cars, the more accidents! (it's like, "no shit, there are more cancer deaths in United States than Switzerland!") NHTSA publishes the vehicle miles traveled: in 2000 2,749,803,000,000 [dot.gov] VMT, in 2001 2,781,462,000,000 [dot.gov] VMT, in 2002 2,855,756,000,000 [dot.gov] VMT. So if we use a meaningful figure, such as number of alcohol-related accidents per billion vehicle miles traveled, then we get: 2000 had 6.32, 2001 had 6.26, and 2002 had 6.10! So in truth, the percentage of alcohol-related deaths compared to miles traveled has decreased in the last three years! Sure, the decrease is not much, but you see how these statistics are taken out of context.
