Teenage drivers are at risk on the road – there’s no question about it. Car accidents are the leading cause of death of 16–19 year-olds, and crashes on the road kill more teens than cancer, homicide, and suicide combined. In the United States, teen driver and peer passenger deaths account for one-quarter of total teen deaths every year.
But a 2011 national research report from The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and State Farm shows that the impact of teen driver crashes extends far beyond teen drivers’ families and friends. In 2008, more than half a million (681,000) people were involved in crashes where a teen driver was behind the wheel. More than 40,000 were injured, and nearly 30 percent of those who died in these crashes were not in cars driven by teens.
In other words, distracted or impaired teen drivers are not just a danger to themselves.
“When most people think about those affected by teen driver crashes, they think of the teens behind the wheel. We must also consider the significant impact of these crashes on other members of our communities: occupants of other vehicles, pedestrians, cyclists, and other road-users,” says Dennis Durbin, M.D., M.S.C.E., co-scientific director of the Center for Injury Research and Prevention at CHOP, and a co-author of the report.
”Whether we have a teen driver in our family or not, we should all care about this issue. This report provides a concrete way to measure the effectiveness of laws, education, and other programs in reducing teen crashes and their impact on communities.”
The authors of the report also stress that teen fatalities are just "the tip of the iceberg." Thousands more – including friends, family members, and others on the road – suffer physical injuries, psychological trauma, and disruption to their everyday lives.
Why Does It Happen? And What Can Be Done?
It’s one thing to point out the high numbers of car crashes caused by teen drivers, as well as the additional dangers teen drivers can pose for other drivers. The State Farm®/CHOP team goes a step further and investigates the causes of their findings, and also looks hard at the question of what can be done.
“Reducing speeding and alcohol use, increasing seat-belt use, and eliminating distractions for teen drivers are the four calls to action we see in this report that would have great impact on reducing injuries and fatalities for all road users,” says Dr. Durbin, who is also an emergency physician. “More than half of teens who were fatally injured in crashes were speeding, 40 percent had a positive blood alcohol level, more than half were not wearing seat belts, and 16 percent of teen drivers involved in fatal crashes were reported to have been distracted while driving.”
Research shows most of these tragedies are due to inexperience, and are therefore preventable. Strong Graduated Driver Licensing (GDL) laws, which allow teens to gain experience under lower-risk conditions, are proven to be one effective measure. To further reduce the number of deaths and injuries with teens behind the wheel, public health programs, GDL, and other traffic safety laws should focus on the key teen behaviors known to raise crash risk: speeding, alcohol use, distractions from peer passengers, and cell phones, as well as failure to wear a seat belt.
The federal government recently expanded its Healthy People 2020 initiative to add target goals related to teen driving, including a 10 percent reduction in fatality rate and a 10 percent increase in seat-belt use. The State Farm/CHOP report will help monitor annual progress toward these goals, as well as other important indicators of teen driving safety.
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CHOP, crash, experience, GLL, habits, hazard, life, parents, passenger, risk, safety, teen
