Drinking and driving:

Drinking and driving:

i was watching "road wars" late last night, and i came to thinking, if for example the amount of drink you can have is, 2 units before you are over the limit, then those 2 units affect differant people in differant ways, for example men can drink more than women (not being sexist its true),

so what i am asking is, isn't it about time that they changed the law, so that you can't drink ANYTHING before getting into a car? wouldn't that be easier than drinking those 2 units?

and i don't care what people say, you cannot drive better if you have had a few drinks.

 

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Lucifers angel you got to understand...in future a point will arise...were people will have to follow such strict rules they set for themselves, that unless they do it exactly right they are safe from being arrested. I am just saying that the more of these so called small laws of freedom oppression there are...the more people will be enclosed inside yet more cages. Let those drinks be there, let that maximum alcohol content exist there...because we are not robots and do not wish to become like robots.

 

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no i know that, but however hundreds of people are injured or killed on the roads each year, and if they didn't drink anything at all then thye wouldn't injured or killed! better safe than sorry

 

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In truth, I've never heard of that standard. In the U.S. we go by blood alcohol content. I can't find a state-by-state listing, but the "legal limit" is generally 0.08%. In Washington state, that means you effectively lose the right to argue that you weren't impaired.

See also:

• Blood Alcohol Content Calculator

• Blood Alcohol Estimation Chart

• Former cop registers 0.47% in Seattle area

• Repeat offender registers 0.55% in Oregon​

What, seriously? People still say that?

 

Would it not be logical to not drink at all before driving as even drinking a bit could still impair driving. Setting a legal limit to say don't drink over this much is fair enough, but surely it does make sense to not drink anything knowing that you will get behind the wheel.

 

What about smoking weed then? I've seen reports that suggest being stonned a little bit makes you a much more cautious driver. I don't agree myself, I think if you're driving you should be completely clear-headed.

 

Yeah. Really you need a clear head in order to be ok to drive. At least thats what I think. Even when you have a clear head you need to be focused and still accidents happen.

 

that is what i was saying!

shouldn't they just ban drinking and driving alltogether, even a little tipple of wine?>

 

I say yes.

 

Drink all you want but take a taxi home or just stay at home and drink yourself to death. Just don't drive if you drink.

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Well your example is out of date, it used to be 2 units, but as you say that affects different people to different degrees. Also what consists of a 'unit' has changed, it used to be a glass of wine is 1, now it's nearly 2. It also depends how long it's been since your last drink and how long you were drinking it for. Alcohol stays in your blood for 24 hours and I believe this is the reason there is a blood alcohol level that you should not exceed when behind the wheel, it's not there so people can drink a bit and then drive it's there so if you have to drive the following day/night you shouldn't be over the limit.
As far as things go the only way to be sure you aren't driving drunk is not to drive for 24 hours after having any alcohol.
Whilst we're on the subject however studies have shown driving tired to be just as impairing to one's judgement as being over the limit, or indeed being hopped up on drugs, but if every tired driver stayed at home the roads would be virtually empty.
To be entirely honest with you from what I've seen of people's normal driving alcohol is the least of our worries.

 

I'm pretty sure that you metabolize about one drink per hour. So if you only drink one drink per hour, you'll never get drunk.

As far as zero % BAC as the limit, that would pretty much put most bars out of business and kill the sales of wine/mixed drinks at restaurants which is a huge cash cow for them. It'll never happen.

Well, perhaps in a big city where public transportation is available, but in most of the country it's drive or stay home. So Zero BAC as the limit would mean zero business at bars and no alcohol sold at restaurants.

Here's a BAC calculator.
http://www.rupissed.com/
According to it I could chug 5 beers and still be way under the limit!

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I think it depends how you're defining a single drink.
Some reading material.
http://www.nhsdirect.nhs.uk/articles/article.aspx?articleid=853

 

I have never had an accident in the many years both riding and driving. A few near misses caused by others but otherwise lucky.

Then recently when doing some cross country dirt bike riding we decided to swig a few mouth full’s of bourbon that a friend had brought along. I did not feel pissed but my confidence level went up. I was riding hard jumping higher and generally thinking I was on top of the world until coming around a corner I came off after hitting a rut in the track and broke 3 ribs, punchered a lung and dislocated my shoulder. I was not over the limit, nether was my ability to handle the bike impaired. What was impaired was my judgement, my ability to assess the danger and respond appropriately, to ride within my limits.

Any amount of alcohol is dangerous when driving or handling machinery. Don’t be fooled to think that there is a limit that is safe. The rules should be changed to zero tolerance.

 

Should the speed limit also be set to 25 mph? It would be safer.

I've driven plenty of times after having a beer or two or perhaps a glass of wine with dinner. Hell, damn near every business meeting I go to involves us all drinking wine and then driving home. We're not a bunch of idiots chugging beers , no one is anywhere near the legal limit. And no one goes out and drives like an idiot afterwards.

Your proposal would put bars across the country out of business and seriously hurt the restaurant business as well for a very small (if any) gain in safety. Next time you hear of some drunk causing a wreck, you'll likely notice the BAC was a .2 or higher. Way above the present standard of .08.

 

That would be a good start.

It only takes a small error in judgment to caused death and injury. Personally I would prefer to have much greater control over who can drive in the first place. I suggest that the majority of drivers don’t have the concentration skills or correct attitude to have the right to drive.

Public transport and taxies should be the preferred mode of transport.

You think people are going to stop drinking because they can’t drive. I use a cab, or have a designated driver, or simply walk.

38% of road death are alcohol related BAC over 0.01. Zero tolerance will save 16000 lives each year in the US alone

 

LA there are a couple of reasons why there is a legal limit.

The first problem with a zero BAC is that a lot of medications and chocolates have some level of achole in them which would stop you driving when your safe (which is why in WA i belive the BAC for a P-plater is 0.01 rather than 0.00 like it is in the rest of the states).

The second problem is that if you sit down and have a glass of wine with dinner you are statistically safe to drive. What if your kid needed you to come and get them or some other unexpected "emergency" came up that needed dealing with.

By having a 0.05 (australian limit across all jusristictions) limit the goverment alows you to have some level of achole and while your still statisically safe deal with these situations that may arise.

They still encorage zero BAC by encoraging designated drivers and use of public transport (well everywhere except SA where they have really stupid laws relating to PT and achole) as do restraunts and pubs (by giving free soft drinks ect to DD) but legislativly they accept that there are going to be times people need to drive after having a small amount of achole (or after a long time period) and so statistically they say this is a resonably safe limit

I will try to find some statistics relating to car acidents above and below 0.05 because i actually found the difference in crashs between those who had zero and low levels of achole to those who were at 0.05 and above amazing

 

I got the stats wrong and edited my last post. Didn’t read the reference correctly.

 

A total of 15,829 alcohol-related fatalities were recorded in in the US in 2006. Of those, 13,470 were drunk drivers (Blood Alcohol Concentration above .08). That's one death nearly every ½ hour in this country as a result of drinking and driving.
Approximately 275,000 persons are injured or disfigured yearly by alcohol-impaired drivers. One third of these are children.

 

Blindman im sorry but there is a problem with the way your figures are expresed. They ignore the levels of achole in the person compleatly and treat it as a yes\no question. For this debate we would need the percentage of drives involved in crashs with a zero (or 0.01) BAC, the percentage with a 0.01 to 0.05 (or 0.08 if you prefer the US method) and then those involved ABOVE 0.05

This is the only way you can prove that the gap between zero and the current legal limit is dangorious. As i said i do have those figures but i will have to go back through EM&J to my drink driving thread to find them