Drunk driving is extremely dangerous and drivers with high blood alcohol concentration (BAC) are at increased risk of car accidents, vehicular deaths and highway injuries. All over the world thr authorities are looking for prevention measures like suspending or revoking driver licenses, increasing penalties such as fines or jail for drunk driving, and mandating alcohol education. The biggest problem is that the drunk drivers consider that they are more sober than they are in reality.

There are many ways that a person could give themselves the illusion that they are more sober. Drinking coffee increases awareness and the drinker believes that they are more sober. In reality, the person is still impaired for the purposes of driving, as their coordination, reaction time, etc. are still affected by the alcohol.

Eating various dehydrated and salty products such as crackers, chips and pretzels may settle the stomach allowing the consumer to feel more sober when, in reality, they are simply keeping their blood sugars from crashing, as drinking without the consumption of food would.

The major problem with a person’s blood alcohol content is that BAC is not the only thing that can determine a persons sobriety. There are people with BAC lower than 0.08%, but they also show signs of impairment. The good thing is that more and more countries allow for DUI charges and conviction when a driver has a slightly lower BAC but fails field sobriety tests, drives erratically, or otherwise shows signs of being impaired.

Every single injury and death caused by drunk driving is totally preventable. The proportion of crashes that are alcohol-related has dropped dramatically since the authorities started to according them more importance, anyway there are still far too many such preventable accidents, and, in spite of great progress, alcohol-impaired driving remains a serious national problem that tragically effects many victims annually.

Most drivers who have had something to drink have low BAC, while only a few drivers have BACs higher than .15, yet a much higher proportion of those drivers have fatal crashes. The relative risk of death for drivers in single-vehicle crashes with a high BAC is 385 times that of a zero-BAC driver and for male drivers the risk is 707 times that of a sober driver, according to statistics.

A low BAC led to a slight improvement in driving skills by experimental subjects, according to researchers at Yale University. Research participants tried to “drive” safely using a driving simulator. Their driving skills were tested with no blood alcohol content, at .04 BAC, at .08 (the legal limit for driving), and at .10. Although there was a slight improvement in driving ability at the lowest BAC level (.04), abilities decreased as BAC increased above that level.

We strongly recommend to everyone reading this article to stay out of alcohol abuse, however, if you or someone close to you have problems with alcohol addiction, we suggest you to visit Canada Drug Rehab