Preventing Deaths from Drunk Driving - Essay Example

Preventing Deaths from Drunk Driving Drunk driving has been proved to be one of the major causes of road accidents consuming thousands of lives. Many people attending social events that serve alcohol as part of beverages have at one time driven themselves while drunk. Drunk driving is categorized as a social problem because the affected persons are attached to the society. In addition, when drunk drivers get into the road, they affect other road users when involved in accidents. Therefore, the repercussions of drunk driving affect the whole society at large. This essay will discuss the problem of drunk driving and further propose the best solution to the problem.
To start with, drivers who drive under alcohol influence have impaired driving skills. According to Duke University, drunk drivers show deviations from pure rational decision making (4). Driving under influence of alcohol makes many people fail to obey the traffic rules accordingly or even fail to see the road signs at all. This is because many of those drivers may have taken the alcohol for fun or out of stress. Those who consume the alcohol for the fun bit of it may start exercising funny driving habits like driving with loud music in the vehicles just for fun but, loud music can cause obstruction to the driver leading to accident. On the other hand, drivers who take alcohol as a way of relieving stress can unknowingly drive the vehicles at very high or extremely low speeds that can obstruct other road users leading to accident.
Secondly, the road fatalities that result from drunk driving are alarmingly high calling for attention to solve the problem. Considering the number of road trips taken by people while driving under alcohol influence, the increased road fatalities are inevitable. According to Mothers Against Drunk Driving, “one out of every two thousand trips” are taken by drivers under alcoholic influence in America (1). This indicates the high probability of having road accidents caused by drunk drivers. Further, Mothers Against Drunk Driving state that someone gets killed in a drunk driving accident on an average of 53 minutes (1). The large numbers of deaths resulting from drunk driving indicate the seriousness of the problem to the society.
However, despite the seriousness of the problem, there exists a viable solution that when implemented could result into zero alcohol related accidents. Incorporation of technology to assist deter drunk drivers from driving vehicles can minimize if not end the problem. Use of alcohol detection gadgets by police on road patrol and incorporation of the gadgets as part of vehicle operation can help greatly. Use of alcohol breath testers by police on road patrol can help prevent alcohol related accident and net repeat offenders who by use of law can be forced to undertake alcohol rehabilitation program. This way, the rate of alcohol addiction can be reduced since many addicts can be rehabilitated and eventually become normal people.
On the same note, the most effective method involving use of technology is incorporating car operation mechanisms with alcohol detectors. For example, the ignition system can be intertwined with alcohol detectors to bar drunk drivers from starting the vehicles (DUI Foundation 1). The ignition machine used to detect alcohol is made in such a way that drivers have to blow into the machine before starting the vehicle and also at intervals while driving. If alcohol is detected before starting the vehicle, the starting system cannot work hence barring the driver from driving the car (DUI Foundation 1). If alcohol is detected while driving, the vehicle hooting and lighting systems work automatically enabling the police to note drunk drivers easily (DUI Foundation 1).
The incorporation of technology to stop drunk driving is feasible and workable owing to two major factors. Firstly, governments can subsidize production of the gadgets in order to make vehicle manufacturers install the gadgets at lower costs in the vehicles. This ways, the cost of purchasing vehicles will not be affected greatly and drunk driving will be stopped all together since no drunk driver will be able to operate vehicles. Secondly, governments should enact laws to make it mandatory for vehicle manufacturers to fit in vehicles the subsidized alcohol detection gadgets. Further, governments should make vehicle inspection mandatory before issuing insurance licenses to certify that alcohol detection gadgets have been fitted and not tampered with.
Of more significance is that incorporation of technology to deal with drunk driving is more effective than other methods. This is because other methods can be maneuvered through by drunk drivers. For example, withdrawal of licenses from drunk drivers has been shown not to be effective. According to Mothers Against Drunk Driving, 50-75% of caught drunk drivers, whose licenses have been revoked, still drive vehicles even without licenses (1). Further, arresting the drunk drivers and charging them in courts does not yield significant positive results because some of the culprits return to their original behavior after sometime.
In conclusion, drunk driving is a serious problem in the society that needs to be addressed using approaches that have tangible positive results. Governments should consider incorporating technology as part of the solution to deal with the problem because use of gadgets such as ignition machines deal with individual drivers as opposed to police patrols where only suspected drivers are stopped. In addition, use of technology in solving drunken driving problem is feasible through government subsidies and benefits accrued from economies of scale while producing the gadgets in large quantities.

Works Cited
DUI Foundation. Prevention. n.d. Web. 12 May. 2014. .
Duke University. The Behavioral Economics of Drunk Driving. 2013. Web. 12 May. 2014. .
Mothers Against Drunk Driving. About Drunk Driving. n.d. Web. 12 May. 2014. < http://www.madd.org/drunk-driving/about/>. Read More